FIA GT: Podium results for the Audi teams at Navarra

By Johan Laubscher

Navarra in Spain hosted the fifth and penultimate FIA GT Series round this weekend.

Four Audi R8 LMS ultra cars were entered, three from Belgian Audi Team WRT and one from Team Novadriver. WRT arrived with the goal of maintaining their advantage at the head of the driver’s and team’s points standings. 

During qualifying the Audis showed very well, as Stippler and Sandström qualified on the front row. The qualifying race got underway in wet conditions, with many teams gambling on tires. The #12 WRT Audi suffered on the wrong tires, but a terrific battle for second place ensued between the #11 and #13 WRT Audis. By the end of the race the #13 of Stippler and Sandtröm finished second, as Ortelli and Vanthoor dropped back to seventh, having gambled on the wrong tires during the pitstop. The #14 Team Novadriver Audi finished sixth overall, taking third in the PAM class. 

The main championship race on Sunday saw another podium result for WRT, as the #13 crew finished third, followed by their teammates in the #12 in fifth. The #11 of Vanthoor and Ortelli suffered brake issues and finished fifteenth. Team Novadriver finished ninth overall, again on the PAM podium. The championship battle will come down to the final round at Baku, as Ortelli and Vanthoor lead the standings in the #11 WRT Audi, just five points ahead of Stippler and  Sandström in the #13 WRT Audi. Belgian Audi Club Team WRT remain in the lead of the team’s championship points.

The finale of the FIA GT Series will be the Baku City Challenge in Azerbaijan, to be hosted from 22-24 November.

Photo credit: FIA GT Series

FIA GT: Front row for WRT and pole position for Novadriver Audis at Navarra

By Tarek Ramchani

Navarra this weekend is home of the penultimate round of the newly formed FIA GT Series. The Audi squad arrived in Spain with four Audi R8 LMS ultra machines.All the cars performed very well this afternoon in the qualifying session.

Two teams are representing Audi Sport customer racing in the Spanish meeting. Belgian Audi Club Team WRT with a three-car effort and Team Novadriver from Portugal with a single car entry.

Both teams cars made to the Super Pole, open for the 10 fastest cars. The #13 Audi R8 LMS ultra from Belgian Audi Club Team WRT secured a fine second place. The car is driven by Edward Sandstrom and Frank Stippler. Their team-mates Niki Mayr-Melnhof and Oliver Jarvis were right behind in third with the #12 Audi. Olliver Jarvis is replacing this weekend René Rast who is busy with Prosperia C Abt Racing in ADAC GT Masters. The series points leaders Stéphane Ortelli and Laurens Vanthoor qualified in seventh place driving the #11 R8 LMS ultra.

Team Novadriver took a sensational pole position in Pro-Am class with their #14 Audi R8 LMS ultra. The Portuguese Audi is driven by César Campaniço and new comer to the team Michael Ammermuller. A great result for Novadriver after a very hard meeting last time out in Slovakia.

Unfortunately, Phoenix Racing is not taking part in this event. The German team already missed the previous round at Slovakia Ring.

Photo credit: FIA GT Series

FIA GT: Maintaining the advantage: key objective for the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT at Navarra

Belgian Audi Club Team WRT Press Release

Following the end of the Blancpain Endurance Series last weekend at the Nürburgring, the focus of the GT community shifts to the FIA GT Series, the other top series in GT racing, which heads to the one-before-last stop of the season. 
This will be at Navarra, the modern and very pleasant track near Pamplona, in  Northern Spain. The Belgian Audi Club Team WRT goes to Spain with the clear objective to maintain and possibly improve the nice advantage it has built in both the Drivers’ and Teams’ standings. At the moment, the three driver line-ups of the team are leading in the Drivers’ competition, a situation that anticipates an interesting ‘family battle’ between Ortelli-Vanthoor, Sandström-Stippler and Mayr-Melnhof, in that order in the standings. For this round, Niki Mayr-Melnhof will have a different team mate, as René Rast is taken by other commitments and replaced by Britain’s Oliver Jarvis, who is everything but a new face in the team. In the Teams’ standings, the Belgian squad has a comfortable 36-point advantage over the runner-up.

Spirits are high in the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT ahead of this fifth round. “In the first place, because it is always a great pleasure to go to such a nice circuit as Navarra”,explains Team WRT Principal Vincent Vosse. “It has been a regular fixture in SRO-ran series over the years, and we have done well in the past there, but most of all, it’s a nice track in a nice region, very well managed by Michel Ligonnet and his team.”

“We enjoy a good position in both championships at the moment”, continues Vosse, “and the objective is to keep things that way: maintain the advantage and if possible, increase it ahead of the final round in Baku. Being a street circuit and a new track for most of the participants, so it would be safer to get to Azerbaijan with a sufficient margin of points. The advantage we have at the moment doesn’t mean at all that things will be easy in Spain. The competition is very strong and we will still have to cope with an unfavorable Balance of Performance, but I don’t want to sing the same song once again. We will be running the cars in their 2013 configuration in Spain, to show we are not seeking confrontation. I think we proved sufficiently our point in Slovakia at the last round and there is no need to run in 2012 specs one more time.”

Traditionally, the Audis R8 LMS ultra have been competitive at Navarra. It is a track really appreciated by drivers. “With its natural design, many up and downs through the hills, and technical corners with different surface inclination, it offers a really exciting driving experience. The turns are mostly medium-slow, which generally is not the most interesting configuration, but here they are really technical, and Turn 1 is a nice fast curve. It’s a track that may be tough on the brakes, but at this period of the year, cooler temperatures should help.”

Clearly, one of the main points of interest in Spain will be the battle for the Drivers’ title, which sees an unusual situation, with three driver teams of the same squad (Team WRT!) at the top of the points table. “It’s always an interesting situation to have a family affair of this kind”, reckons Sporting Director Pierre Dieudonné, “but we are clearly taking the option not to interfere at all, for the sake of the sports. We trust the professionalism and fair-play of our drivers, who are all grown-up boys, and they will be free to play their cards, within only one boundary: not to hurt the team’s interests.”

The six drivers in contention will actually be five, as René Rast, who normally partners with Niki Mayr-Melnhof, on car #12, will not be in Spain. The German is in a position to fight for the ADAC GT Masters title as well and will be participating in the finale of the German series that takes place at Hockenheim on the same weekend. He will be replaced by another Audi driver, Oliver Jarvis, who knows well the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT and will be given a warm ‘welcome back’ by everybody.

The key players in the fight look forward to the weekend. Laurens Vanthoor, who together with Stéphane Ortelli, has a 19-point advantage at the moment, reflects: “It will be important for us to continue scoring consistently as we have been doing so far in 2013. Of course any mistakes now are going to be punished so we have to be careful as well as quick. Battling a car from the same team is very difficult but as long as we maintain the respect which we have done so far then it should be only fun at Navarra.”

In the role of the chaser, Frank Stippler and Edward Sandström are obliged to attack. “We have a gap to close and we intend to start in Spain this weekend”, confirms the German “We need to score heavy points in Navarra and it definitely should be a very interesting weekend.”

The weekend will have a compact format, with free practice and qualifying on Saturday and both the Qualifying and Main races taking place on Sunday.

FIA GT Series - Round 5

Navarra, Spain

28-29 September 2013

Timetable

Saturday 28th September 2013

10:00-11:20 Free Practice 1

12:35-13:50 Free Practice 2

17:00-18:00 Qualifying

Sunday 29th September 2013

10:15-11:15 Qualifying Race

14:15-15:15 Main Race

Belgian Audi Club Team WRT

#11  Stéphane Ortelli (MC) - Laurens Vanthoor (BE) (Pro)

#12  Nikolaus Mayr-Melnhof (AT) – Oliver Jarvis (GB) (Pro)

#13  Edward Sandström (SE) - Frank Stippler (DE) (Pro)

Drivers’ (Pro) Championship Standings after Race 8 of 12

1. Vanthoor-Ortelli - 94 points

2. Sandström-Stippler - 75

3. Rast – Mayr-Melnhof - 63

3. Buhk-Day - 53

5. Zuber-Parisy - 39

Teams’ (Pro) Championship Standings after Race 8 of 12

1. Belgian Audi Club Team WRT - 120 points

2. Loeb Racing - 84

3. BMW Team Brazil - 78

4. HTP Gravity Charouz - 62

Photo credit: Belgian Audi Club

FIA GT: 1-2-3 Pro Cup Belgian Audi Club Team WRT in Slovakia Ring Championship Race

By Tarek Ramchani

Slovakia Ring hosted two great FIA GT Series races today. The Qualifying Race was held earlier this morning followed by the main Championship Race later in the afternoon. Audi performed very well in both events.

In the Qualifying Race the Audi R8 LMS ultra cars from Belgian Audi Club Team WRT battled very hard with the McLaren MP4-12C from Sebastien Loeb Racing and the Lamborghini Gallardo from Reiter Engineering. After a very competitive race the #11 Audi R8 LMS ultra shared by Laurens Vanthoor and Stéphane Ortelli finished second, behind race winners Sebastien Loeb and Alvaro Parente. The sister #12 Audi R8 LMS ultra driven by René Rast and Nikki Mayr-Melnhof was fifth. The #13 Audi of Frank Stippler and Edward Sandstrom finished ninth after a drive through penalty. It was a though race for the Portuguese Team Novadriver, their #14 Audi was damaged and finished in seventeenth position.

The main Championship Race in the afternoon turned out to be very good for the Audi squad. Stéphane Ortelli lead the race from the start with much happening behind him. Their was early contact between the pole-sitting McLaren MP4-12C of Sebastien Loeb and the Lamborghini Gallardo of Peter Cox, this eliminated both cars from contention. Unfortunately Ortelli had to serve a drive through penalty for jumping the start. When Laurens Vanthoor took over the car he was able to recover and brought the car back to the front of the pack, and even caught up to his teammates. Meanwhile the race had a surprising new leader, the #2 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 from HTP Gravity Charouz. Behind the Czech SLS the Audis were grouped together and started to battle each other. No team orders at the Belgian customer team, and a fierce fight started on track between René Rast, Frank Stippler and Laurens Vanthoor. The three drivers were fighting for second overall on track, but also for the Pro-Cup class win, and most impotently for big points in the overall championship standings. Rast lead the WRT pack to the checkered flag, whilst Vanthoor was able to pass Stippler for third place, with only a few minutes before the checkered flag. It was a great 1-2-3 finish for WRT in the Pro Cup class. Up front the HTP Mercedes-Benz took a comfortable overall win with drivers Sergey Afanasiev and Andreas Simonsen. Team Novadriver again faced a very unlucky race and they were forced to retire after only a few laps into the race.

The next event of the FIA GT Series will be in Spain, hosted at the popular Navarra Circuit in September.

Photo credit: FIA GT Series

FIA GT: Pole position for Belgian Audi Club Team WRT at Slovakia Ring

By Tarek Ramchani

The FIA GT Series is in Slovakia this weekend, hosted at the Slovakia Ring. Only four Audi R8 LMS ultra cars are entered in this fourth meeting of the season. Phoenix Racing decided not to enter the event, however the qualifying session gave Audi great satisfaction.

Belgian Audi Club Team WRT took a fantastic pole position today. For this meeting the team decided to race with the 2012 specification Audi R8 LMS ultra, to take advantage of the different 2012 vs 2013 specification BoP. It was a good decision as WRT was among the fastest during the sessions. In the end it was René Rast who was the fastest in Super Pole, driving the #12 Audi R8 LMS ultra. The three-time Porsche Supercup champion is sharing the car with Niki Mayr-Melnhof. Another car from team WRT also did very well, the #11 R8 LMS ultra of Laurens Vanthoor and Stépahne Ortelli. The series points leaders ended in fourth place, behind the two Sebastien Loeb Racing McLaren MP4-12C cars.

The two remaining Audi R8 LMS ultra cars were outside of the top 10. The #13 car of Frank Stippler and Edward Sandström from Belgian Audi Club Team WRT, and the #14 Audi from Team Novadriver driven by Carlos Viera and Cesar Campanico.

The Qualifying and Championship Races are set for tomorrow, with live stream coverage offered on the official FIA GT Series website.

Photo credit: FIA GT Series

FIA GT: WRT switches to 2012 spec Audi R8 LMS ultra

By Johan Laubscher

Belgian Audi Club Team WRT has switched back to the 2012 specification of the Audi R8 LMS ultra in Slovakia this weekend.

Balance of Performance has been the buzzword in recent weeks, as the R8 LMS ultra’s BoP has been scrutinised as being too harsh. Despite this the FIA announced this week that the R8 LMS ultra BoP would remain unchanged, despite the events at the Spa 24 Hours.

WRT are currently competing in round four of the FIA GT Series at the Slovakia Ring this weekend. They have opted to retrofit their cars with the 2012 R8 LMS ultra specification, thus defining them as 2012 models and the older car BoP. They have noted that the 2012 Audi BoP is less harsh than the current 2013 Audi BoP, thus it was a beneficial move which has paid handsome dividends so far.

The differences between the 2012 and 2013 Audi R8 LMS ultra can be seen HERE.

The second Audi team at the event in Slovakia is Team Novadriver, who’s #14 Audi R8 LMS ultra has remained in 2013 specification. The third Audi team in the FIA GT Series, Phoenix Racing, unfortunately withdrew from the event - their press releases regarding the withdrawal can be seen HERE.

Photo credit: FIA GT Series

FIA GT: Phoenix duo Ide/Kumpen will not contest the FIA GT race at the Slovakia Ring

Phoenix Racing Press Release

Phoenix Racing will not join the grid for the fourth round of the FIA GT Series on August 17/18 at Slovakia Ring with its Belgian driver pairing of Enzo Ide and Anthony Kumpen.

The team and drivers have decided to withdraw from the race at the Slovakia Ring close to Bratislava after the difficult 24-hour race at Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium, during which the Audi R8 LMS GT3 was heavily damaged in an accident in the closing stages of the race.

“It was plain to see at the Spa 24-hour race just how difficult things are currently. When we compete we also want to have the opportunity to fight for victory. This is not currently possible under normal circumstances. It goes without saying that the motivation also suffers, especially for our partners Enzo Ide and Anthony Kumpen. For this reason, we have decided not to race at the Slovakia Ring,” explains Phoenix Team Boss Ernst Moser.

The team and drivers will decide at a later date whether the #5 Phoenix Audi of Ide/Kumpen, who currently share eighth position in the standings after three rounds, will compete in the remaining FIA GT Series races at Navarra/Spain (September 28/29) and in Baku/Azerbaijan (October 19/20).

Photo credit: Phoenix Racing

FIA GT: One win and three other podium finishes for the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT at Zandvoort

Belgian Audi Club Press Release

The sunny weather that blessed Zandvoort over the weekend brought well to the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT, which left the track in the dunes of the popular beach resort in the Netherlands with a strengthened leadership in both the Drivers’ and Teams’ rankings of the FIA GT Series.
 Although clearly not the fastest cars on the track, the Audis R8 LMS ultra of the Belgian squad took heavy points thanks to good pace and perfect races by its drivers and pit crews. Stéphane Ortelli and Laurens Vanthoor won the Qualifying race on Saturday and took second on Sunday, reinforcing their points lead. Edward Sandström and Frank Stippler strengthened their second position thanks to a fourth and a third, respectively. Nicky Mayr-Melnhof and René Rast had an unluckier weekend, as after taking third in Race 1, they were forced to retirement in Race 2. The very positive weekend in the Netherlands is the best encouragement as the team heads back to Belgium to finalize preparation for the biggest event of the year, the Total 24 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps in a three week time.

“It was a positive weekend for us, especially towards the championship situation”, summed up Team WRT Principal Vincent Vosse on Sunday afternoon. “It was clear that the Audi was not the most competitive car on track, and that the Mercedes were much faster, but we were able to extract the maximum from what we had in our hands. We really have a superb driver line-up of drivers and a great time, and this showed again over the weekend. I am very proud of the excellent job done by everybody. Our pit crews made it a 1-2-3 in the ranking of fastest pit stops, in both races, and that is something that makes me particularly happy.”

Qualifying wasn’t particularly successful for the Belgian squad: Vanthoor took third but couldn’t do anything against the McLaren of Parente and the Mercedes of Afanasiev, while Rast (5th) suffered from wrong pressure tires and Stippler (8th) admitted that “we lost precious time testing some solutions that did not work as expected.”

The start of the Qualifying race was particularly hot and saw a sensational kick-off of Vanthoor from row 2, who dived into the inside of the Tarzan corner to emerge as the leader. “We were three cars side by side, and I was slightly pushed into the grass of the inside. It was a close one but it went through”, admitted the young Belgian. The other Audis also took an excellent start, with Rast third and Stippler sixth at the end of lap 1. Soon after, the safety-car had to intervene, and after the re-start, Vanthoor’s pace was not the same (“The behavior of the car had changed and we have to understand why”) and Rast took the lead in lap 15. After perfect pit stops for the three cars, Ortelli took the lead from Mayr-Melnhof in lap 22, with Sandström in fourth. The Mercedes in third, though, became more and more threatening. It eventually passed the Austrian three laps to the end and finished in Ortelli’s streamline. A sweaty Stéphane admitted: “It wasn’t easy at all to keep the Mercedes behind in the closing laps, especially on such a demanding circuit, but fortunately we were quite fast in the last corner before the straight and this allowed me to keep the advantage in the straight and the slower corners.”

Right after the finish, an unusual incident occurred in the pit lane which could have had serious consequences. While drivers and mechanics of the various teams were greeting each other and waiting for the cars to come back to the victory zone, a car of the race direction going through the pit lane at some speed hit René Rast, running over his right foot. The German driver was immediately brought to the medical center and complained of severe pain on his foot, ankle, ribs and arm but fortunately, nothing was broken and he was cleared for racing on Sunday morning.

The Main race on Sunday also saw a safety-car period in the very initial stages, but that did not change anything to the hierarchy as the Mercedes of Buhk-Day dominated from first to last lap, with Ortelli-Vanthoor and Sandström-Stippler firmly in second and third for the entire race, held in quite warm conditions. For the other Audi Belgian Club Team WRT car, things did not run as smoothly. Nicky Mayr-Melnhof had been running fourth behind his team mates in his stint, but as soon René Rast took the wheel after the pit stop the car stopped. “We don’t know yet what happened exactly, we will have to investigate”, explained Sporting Director Pierre Dieudonné.

The other Belgian Audi Club members present at Zandvoort, Anthony Kumpen and Enzo Ide, had a difficult weekend with the R8 of Phoenix Racing, finishing 12th on Saturday and retiring after 3 laps on Sunday.

The GT community will now focus on the 24 Hours of Spa and the FIA GT Series will resume mid-August with the Slovakia round.

FIA GT Series - Round 3
Zandvoort, Netherlands
6-7 July 2013

Results Qualifying Race

1. Ortelli-Vanthoor (Audi R8 LMS ultra) 33 laps in 1h01m01s018
2. Buhk-Day (Mercedes SLS) + 0s766
3. Rast-Mayr-Melnhof (Audi R8 LMS ultra) + 2s710
4. Sandström-Stippler (Audi R8 LMS ultra) + 3s129
5. Bueno-Khodair (BMW Z4) + 6s517

Results Main Race

1. Buhk-Day (Mercedes SLS) 35 laps in 1h27m51s001
2. Ortelli-Vanthoor (Audi R8 LMS ultra) + 6s667
3. Stippler-Sandström (Audi R8 LMS ultra) + 6s995
4. Chandhok-Seyffarth (Mercedes SLS) +33s895
5. Proczyk-Baumann (Lamborghini LP560) +40s127
DNF Rast-Mayr-Melnhof (Audi R8 LMS ultra) 14 laps

Drivers’ (Pro) Championship Standings after Race 6 of 12

1. Vanthoor-Ortelli 70 points
2. Sandström-Stippler 60
3. Buhk-Day 53
4. Rast – Mayr-Melnhof 35
5. Kox-Rosina 32

Teams’ (Pro) Championship Standings after Race 4 of 12

1. Belgian Audi Club Team WRT 86 points
2. Loeb Racing 61
3. HTP Gravity Charouz 59
4. BMW Team Brazil 56
5. Seyffarth Motorsport 20

Next FIA GT Series round: Slovakiaring (SK), 17-18 August 2013.

Photo credit: FIA GT Series

FIA GT: Watch Live FIA GT Series at Zandvoort

You can watch the FIA GT Series main Championship Race from Zandvoort Live below. The #11 Audi R8 LMS ultra from the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT will start from pole position. Live Timing can be seen here.

Live Twitter updates:
FIA GT Series
Audi Motorsport Blog
W Racing Team

Photo credit: FIA GT Series

FIA GT: Belgian Audi Club Team WRT victory in Zandvoort Qualifying Race

By Tarek Ramchani

The FIA GT Series resumes this weekend at Zandvoort in the Netherlands, round 3 of the championship. Five Audi R8 LMS ultra cars have been entered from three different teams with very strong performance in the Qualifying Race today.

It was a brilliant  victory for Belgian Audi Club Team WRT. The #11 Audi R8 LMS ultra of Stépahne Ortelli and Laurens Vanthoor was victorious after the 1-hour sprint race, following a battle to the finish line with the #1 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 from HTP. In third was the sister #12 Audi R8 LMS ultra shared by Rene Rast and Niki Mayr-Melnhof. The third #13 Audi R8 LMS ultra from the team finished in a strong fourth, in the hands of Frank Stippler and Edward Sandström.

Further back the Portuguese Audi R8 LMS ultra of Team Novadriver finished eleventh overall, fourth in the Pro Am class. The #14 car was driven by Cesar Campanico and Carlos Viera. The #5 Audi R8 LMS ultra from Phoenix Racing finished in twelfth position. The German run Audi was shared by Anthony Kumpen and Enzo Ide.

A fantastic qualifying race for the Audi Sport customer racing teams at Zandvoort. The main Championship Race is set for tomorrow, with the starting grid being based by the final results from the Qualifying Race today. Fingers crossed for all the three Audi teams and their drivers.

Photo credit: FIA GT Series

The story of the 2013 Audi R8 LMS ultra

By Johan Laubscher

The Audi R8 LMS was introduced in 2009 and almost instantly showed its potential. The cars then went on to claim multiple championships and victories during the next three seasons, until a newly updated version was introduced in 2012, the Audi R8 LMS ultra. This car also claimed much success during the 2012 season, after which further updates were announced for 2013, but the story turned out not to be so simple.

Original CAD image released by Audi Sport customer racing. Photo from Audi Media

At the end of 2012 Audi Sport announced that an upgraded Audi R8 LMS ultra would be available for the 2013 season, with the option for existing teams to purchase upgrade kits for their current R8 LMS / ultra cars. The differences between the original Audi R8 LMS ultra (2012) and the original 2013 version can be seen HERE. 

Team Novadriver testing their newly updated Audi R8 LMS ultra (2013). Photo from Team Novadriver

The new 2013 upgrades were initially shown in CAD designs released as press photos, but the actual new parts were yet to pass final homologation. Much was said about the new 2013 ultra, and many photos appeared online of the first teams taking delivery and testing their new cars, most notably Hitotsuyama Racing (Japan) and Team Novadriver (Portugal).

2013 Audi R8 LMS ultra on display at Geneva. Photo from Fourtitude.com

The new 2013 ultra also made an appearance on the Audi stand at the Geneva Motor Show in March. It was a silver ultra which was also fitted with the facelifted Audi R8 road car front and rear lights, but it should be noted that the cars that compete in competition are fitted with the older R8 road car lights, to lower the cost and damage of the parts in racing.

Audi R8 LMS ultra cars retrofitted to 2012 spec at Nogaro FIA GT Series. Photo from Endurance-Info.com

It all looked set for the new ultra in 2013, as the start of most of the national and international GT Championships approached. However, the ultra was to face major issues during homologation, causing problems for some of the teams who had acquired new ultra cars / upgrade kits. The Audi R8 LMS ultra cars (all in 2013 spec) which were entered for the opening round of the FIA GT Series at Nogaro, had to be altered back into their 2012 specification, due to the homologation discrepancies as the car had not yet passed the process.

The original 2013 Audi R8 LMS ultra rear diffuser. Photo from Audi Media

Eventually the homologation issues, which centered around the lavish new aerodynamic upgrades on the ultra, were sorted out. The 2013 specification Audi R8 LMS ultra was allowed to keep almost all of its parts, the notable omission being the new aggressive rear diffuser. All of the 2013 Audi R8 LMS ultra cars are now required to run with the older specification Audi R8 LMS / ultra rear diffuser, as per the final homologation.

With the “homologation saga” completed, the 2013 cars have been allowed to compete internationally, but amongst all of the confusion regarding homologation, there were five Audi R8 LMS ultra cars which did indeed race in the full original 2013 specification.

The 2013 Audi R8 LMS ultra cars which had competed before final homologation:

The Absolute Racing team at Sepang MSS. Photo from Audi Media

The race debut for the new ultra took place in Malaysia, at round one of the Malaysian Super Series, a support event for the Malaysian Grand Prix at Sepang that weekend (23-24 March 2013). Absolute Racing entered the three cars which were driven by Jeffrey Lee (J-Fly Racing #7 blue), Philip Ma (Team Hong Kong Racing #98 orange) and Francis Hideki Onda (Tunewear Racing #77 red). The weekend was highlighted by a class podium finish for Jeffrey Lee.

M-Sport #10 Audi R8 LMS ultra competing at Oulton Park. Photo from British GT

The second appearance of a 2013 Audi R8 LMS ultra came one week later, in Great Britain. M-Sport, a new Audi Sport customer racing team, entered their 2013 car in the opening round of the British GT Championship at Oulton Park (1 April 2013). It should be noted that this was the same weekend that all the cars at Nogaro (FIA GT Series) were disallowed to compete in the 2013 specification. For M-Sport’s entry the series organisers allowed them special dispensation to compete with the new car, as the team wanted to get use to their new machine. The dispensation included that they run penalty weight and thus they finished lower down in the order. The team’s drivers were Rembert Berg and Warren Hughes. Despite the result they gathered valuable experience with the car, as they demonstrated at round two, running the then fully allowed 2013 specification, finishing second overall at Rockingham.  

Hitotsuyama Racing Audi R8 LMS ultra at Okayama. Photo from Hitotsuyama Racing

The third and final competitive appearance of the full original 2013 specification was seen in Japan at Okayama, the opening round of the Japanese Super GT Series (7 April 2013). This was one week after the British GT and FIA GT Series weekend. The homologation was still not finalised by this point, and again the local series organisers allowed the car to compete, but with restrictions and weight due to its homologation status. Hitotsuyama Racing had entered the Audi R8 LMS ultra, driven by Akihiro Tsuzuki and Richard Lyons, and they finished lower down the field due to the restrictions handicapping the Audi.

The final 2013 homologation with older diffuser, as seen at Monza BES. Photo from Stefano Ciabettoni

The week that followed (8-14 April 2013) saw the appearance of many teams testing 2013 Audi R8 LMS ultra cars, but with the older diffuser. It then emerged that the car had indeed finally been homologated and all of the cars since, in 2013 spec, have been seen with all of the new 2013 components, minus the new diffuser, as they were running the older diffuser. The first cars in the “new and final” 2013 spec were seen competing at the opening round of the Blancpain Endurance Series at Monza and VLN round two at the Nürburgring (13-14 April 2013).

The Audi R8 LMS ultra Race-Taxi at Hockenheim DTM. Photo from cubebikes369 on Youtube

Since the final homologation, the new diffuser as all but disappeared. The only Audi R8 LMS ultra cars seen with the new diffuser are some of the display cars and the Audi Race-Taxi at the DTM events. The red/black Race-Taxi is also sporting the facelifted Audi R8 road car lights.

For now it remains uncertain if the full original 2013 specification will ever be seen in competition again, however the current 2013 cars (as per the final homologation) are beautiful and proving to be very successful so far this season. The R8 LMS ultra remains one of the best GT3 race cars currently available.   

Photo credit: (in order of appearance)

Audi Sport Communication / Media

Team Novadriver

Fourtitude.com

Endurance-Info.com / 86400.fr

British GT

Hitotsuyama Racing

Stefano Ciabettoni - Mr Monza

cubebikes369 on Youtube