15.04.10 Positive start to the season in Paul Ricard

Fourth place was a positive start the 2010 LMS season for Wolfgang Kaufmann and his team.

Le Mans Series 8h Paul Ricard

Wolfgang Kaufmann

Still, the German professional and his colleagues Luca Moro and Steve Zacchia were not entirely happy with the way things turned out. From an underwhelming sixth place on the grid, the trio went into the 8 hour race on the former F1 circuit at Le Castellet. A collision caused by another competitor set the Hope PoleVision crew back some three minutes: "At the beginning of second lap the car in front of me put his braking point so early and hard that I unfortunately couldn't avoid contact with him. I went straight into the pits and had the car checked. When I was back on track, the factory LMP1 cars came up to lap me while I myself was in turn trying to get by the slower GT2 runners", Kaufmann recounts his first turn behind the wheel.

With faultless stints by all three drivers, the team had its sights set on third place in class when Zacchia came into the pits for a routine stop toward the end of the race. A faulty fuse of the starter motor meant the end of their aspirations of a podium finish: "the crew fixed the problem quickly but third place was of course out of reach by that time. Nevertheless we are content with our weekend's work and we know now we have the potential to finish on the podium."

Wolfgang Kaufmann will get no rest this coming weekend as he moves on to Spain for the opening races of the GT Open championship at Valencia where he will drive a Porsche 997 GT3 RSR for team Autorlando Sport.