23rd May

JMW MOTORSPORT ANNOUNCE LE MANS 24 HOUR LINE UP

Rob Bell Joined By Andrew Kirkaldy and Tim Sugden For JMW Motorsport’s Le Mans 24Hr Campaign

JMW Motorsport will be represented by one of the strongest driver line-ups at Le Mans this year with the announcement that regular driver Rob Bell will be joined by Andrew Kirkaldy and Tim Sugden for the prestigious 24 Hour race taking place on 13-14th June 2009.

Rob Bell, one of the team’s regular drivers in the 2009 Le Mans Series, has shown exceptional prowess at the wheel of the Ferrari. The reigning LMS GT2 Champion of 2007 and 2008, he has started his 2009 LMS campaign in fine form with two podiums. Rob is also well acquainted with Andrew as a driving partner, the pair being team-mates in the FIA GT Championship. Andrew, an LMGT2 podium finisher at Le Mans, will be looking for a similar feat this year, the 33 year old Scot a formidable endurance driver. Tim is a veteran of Le Mans and will be giving up his JMW Motorsport managerial duties for the weekend to concentrate on the team’s desire to secure a class win from behind the wheel.

The experienced driver line up gives further incentive to the proficient team lead by Chief Engineer Steve Bunkhall and Chief Mechanic Davey Nicholas as they bid to prepare the Ferrari F430 for LMGT2 glory.

The car will again have the full support of Dunlop and in an exciting move will sport livery designed and chosen through the Dunlop Art Car Competition. Members of the public have until the 27th May to visit www.dunlop.eu and vote for their favourite of the 20 semi-finalists. From these, four will be chosen to visit Le Mans and witness the unveiling of the overall winner.

JMW Motorsport’s foray into the Le Mans 24 Hours will have support from AJ Power, Shell, JBL Professional, Momo and MCW Properties.

Team Principal, Jim McWhirter is delighted with the line up and confident the team can make a strong debut at La Sarthe. “The Le Mans 24 Hours is the most exciting endurance race in the world and we intend to be in the mix at the end! As we say in Irish – ‘Faugh a Ballagh’ (‘clear the way’!)”.

Spa With A Twist!

The second round of the Le Mans Series held at Spa was so full of drama you wouldn’t have been surprised if Bruce Willis had jumped out in action hero mode!

Starting from 3rd on the grid, Gimmi was at the wheel of JMW Ferrari but with a prototype car going off on the warm up lap it was literally just metres under the green flag and the safety car came out for the first of several appearences of the day. Gimmi put in a strong first stint and it was clear the JMW Ferrari was on impressive pace and able to keep within striking distance of the Porsches, which were more suited to the Spa circuit.

Handing over to Rob, he continued the good work but elsewhere on the track numberous prototype accidents were leading the track to become debris strewn. Safety car periods kept the concertina effect going in the field and with Rob putting in strong laps and up to 2nd.

The lead Felbermayr Porsche of Lietz and Lieb was one of the first cars to fall foul of the debris on track with a puncture. Now with the lead, Rob handed over to Gimmi who drove a 3rd stint as if his life depended on it! In a flying display, Gimmi was lapping his LMGT2 rivals and building an enviable lead which Rob eagerly ran with when he returned to the wheel.

A further safety car period all but ate that lead away but the JMW lap times remained impressive and the lead was solid. With Gimmi ready for the final stint of the race, and everyone holding their breath as the Porsches continued to battle hard to regain their advantage a tyre issue on the final handover put pay to their victory drive. Gimmi battled back to the pit and with the problem resolved was back out in 4th and on a charge.

With one hour left it was obvious the team would settle for no less than a podium. Soon up into 3rd, the last moments of the race were to be intterupted by the safety car after a huge crash for an LMP1 car. With just a handful final race laps under green Gimmi came to the chequered flag in 3rd for 4 vital points.

But then like every good action film there was a further surprise twist!

The winning car of Team Felbemayr was excluded from the result due to technical non-compliance. As such the JMW Motorsport was promoted to 2nd.

However, Team Felbermayr have appealed the decision and as such the results for the LMGT2 class will not be confirmed until after the decision of the Court.

We will keep you posted!

Gimmi Bruni “Our average lap times were very encouraging. We have certainly made a big step forward so I am happy. We did have an issue but we win as a team and when we don’t we are a team! We have a learned a lot about the car and I’m looking forward to the rest of the season.

Rob Bell “We’ve made a lot of progress since Spa and were essentially able to keep Porsche in our sights when we knew this was a circuit they could excel at. That increase in pace is certainly very encouraging ahead of Le Mans and the car felt good”.