RideLust

Last Wednesday I attended the first meeting of the Oversteering Committee at Manhattan Motor Cars on the west side of NYC. The committee is made up of automotive marketing and public relations executives and comprises an invitation only membership of automotive, financial, technology and lifestyle journalists, prominent automotive collectors, key influencers and social media experts with the goal of bringing to light new automotive trends. The first meeting was actually pretty impressive as Scott Atherton, ALMS President and CEO, was on hand to share his insights on why the ALMS (American Le Mans Series) is so popular. What’s interesting is that while so many other motor sport series are feeling a hit due to the poor economic climate, ALMS is moving forward thanks to an influx of new car classes, media coverage and competitors.
Read More…

This is the Ferrari 458 GT2 and it’s coming for your soul. The harrowing image of the rip-snorting stallion appeared on the Net a few days ago and is currently striking fear into the heart of GT2 racers everywhere. According to sources close to the company, the demon-horse was recently unleashed on Ferrari’s Fiorano test track, where it howled and screamed for blood.

Source: Autorevolution, Axis of Oversteer

Read More…

Porsche brought their 911 GT3 R Hybrid to this side of the pond, to compete in last weekend’s Petit LeMans at Road Atlanta. The car started from the 43rd spot, but managed an 18th place finish despite two unscheduled pit stops during the event. The car, entered into the GTH class for experimental cars, was co-driven by Timo Bernhard, Mike Rockenfeller and Romain Dumas. Their goal wasn’t so much to win the event, but rather to develop as much information as possible on Porsche’s hybrid drive system under racing conditions. The data gathered will be applied to future racing efforts, and eventually to Porsche road cars as well.

The hybrid drive system in the Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid differs substantially from those used in production cars like the Toyota Prius. The Porsche system is a Kinetic Energy Recover System (KERS), similar to what was developed for Formula One racing in the 2009 season. The GT3 R Hybrid has two electric motors mounted at the front wheels; under braking, these motors act as generators. The energy created is transmitted to a KERS flywheel unit, which sits where the passenger seat would be in an ordinary car. The flywheel, which can spin at up to 40,000 RPM, stores the kinetic energy recovered from braking, but only for a limited amount of time (around eight seconds). Exiting a corner, a driver can use the energy stored in the flywheel to power the front wheel motors, creating a short burst of additional horsepower or reducing the amount of throttle needed (and hence, fuel consumed) to regain speed.

This video may in fact be from 2009 but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s totally appropriate consider yesterday was the 4th of July. What we have here is the crew chief of the Pratt and Miller Corvette C6-R team, Mike West ripping out his version of the National Anthem before the 2009 running of the 24 Hours of LeMans. This guys got some skills with a guitar and hell… anytime you’re mixing Corvette’s and the National Anthem people all over the world can’t help but take notice.

Source: YouTube.com

The new ALMS season is set to kick off at Sebring on March 20, and Corvette Racing will debut their new ZR-1 based race cars in the GT class (called GT2 at the 24 Hours of LeMans). Gone for 2010 is the GT1 class, which has been ruled by the Corvettes since the late 1990s. In the 2009 season, Corvette was the sole remaining entry in the GT1 class.

Read More…

Corvette Paces LeMan Competition

Winning this year’s edition of the world’s most prestigious sports car race had special significance for Corvette Racing because it marks the end of team Corvette C6R’s run in GT1 racing. Corvette Racing begins its transition to a global GT class in 2010 that is chiefly based on current GT2 regulations.

Read More…

Superclass watchmaker TAG Heuer recently took some footage of Steve McQueen from his 1971 classic film Le Mans and awkwardly stuffed it into a commercial so they could pit him against the current F1 champ, Lewis Hamilton. It was interesting to see McQueen go head-to-head with Hamilton, but all the ad really did was make me want to watch the original film.

So keeping with the Ridelust tradition of bringing you the finest automotive cinema (The Italian Machine and C’était un Rendez-Vous), here’s the 1971 Steve McQueen classic in it’s entirety… Le Mans:
Read More…

Jaguar XKF To Race In GT2 Class

Although this would seem the absolute worst time to in which to launch a new racing team, especially in the American Le Mans Series which does not draw like NASCAR; Rocketsports Racing (RSR) and Jaguar are partnering up to field an XKR to run in the GT2 class.  Despite the poor timing, the air does seems a little sweeter with a Jaguar back in the fold of the racing world here in the States.

Read More…

Some of us here at RideLust are old enough to remember when NASCAR was the National Association of Stock Car Racing and not a spec series. We remember waking up early on Sunday mornings to watch Bobby Allison, Cale Yarborough, Ricky Rudd, Dale Earnhardt, and Buddy Baker race against each other in Chevys, Pontiacs, Fords, and Buicks that were actually based on the cars people could buy in the showroom.

What happened to that NASCAR? Who or what took what used to be a fun racing series to watch and turned it into a racing series based little in reality? Read More…

Nearly one year after BMW announced their return to the American Le Mans Series competition at the Chicago Auto Show in February 2008, the BMW Rahal Letterman Racing Team M3 made their officially debut on January 26, 2009 at the Sebring International Raceway. Running the BMW M3 GT2 ALMS racer through the requisite testing during the opening day of the American Le Mans Series Winter Test, team co-owner Bobby Rahal remarked, “The BMW Rahal Letterman Racing Team has worked extremely hard to get the new BMW M3 ready for the ALMS Winter Test and we expect to get a lot accomplished over the three days of testing. We are excited not only to get the cars and drivers on track together, but also to give the BMW fans their much-anticipated first look at the M3 race car.” Read More…