DRAMA FOLLOWS PROGRESS FOR YOKOHAMA TEAM IN LE MANS


Press information: 13 June 2007


Remarkable progress by Yokohama ADVAN in the 24 Hours of Le Mans GT1 class may now be halted with the team's entry, JLOC, struggling to repair the Lamborghini Murcielago R-GT in time for Saturday's historic race.

The supercar was severly damaged earlier today in an accident during the first qualifying session. Driver Marco Apicella, of Italy, was taken to the medical centre for checks and is likely to remain overnight for observation.

In testing earlier this month the ADVAN / JLOC partnership had already virtually equalled the team's best 2006 time, when the Lamborghini used a different tyre manufacturer, despite running a race set-up. Yokohama technicians were confident of improving upon that time during qualifying by as much as two seconds.

"Last year at Le Mans JLOC had a programme with Pirelli and in qualifying and race they had times in the 3:59s," said Yokohama Europe Marketing Manager Kazuyoshi Sekiguchi. "Two weeks ago at the test our time was also 59; a bit slower than last year with Pirelli but the car was not set up in a very competitive way. We are certain this car and our tyre combination could get a time of 3:56."

JLOC is now looking at sourcing new parts to rebuild the car in time for Saturday's race.

Changable track conditions hampered Yokohama's GT2 entry, Seikel Motorsport, as the ADVAN tyres are only currently available as wet tyres or slicks, with the ideal for today's conditions being intermediate. The team, which runs a Porsche 911 GT3 RSR, eventually finished 12th in class with a time of 4:17.750.

"The situation today was bad because the track is not wet or dry," said driver Horst Felbermayr jr. "In general I think the wet tyres are very good from ADVAN and we are used to racing in the wet; three weeks ago we were in Bucharest in the wet and we won.

"The weather forecast keeps changing from sunny to rain so it is very difficult for everybody at the moment.

Yokohama is also confident a wet race could produce excellent results for the Japanese manufacturer. "We have a very good wet tyre," said Sekiguchi. "If it rains a lot we may have more chance to get ahead."

Tomorrow's (Thursday) second and decisive qualifying practice will start at 19:00 CET.