If Friday’s free practice is the start of the end of 2008, then it appears to be coming too soon for the buoyant Embassy Team. Following on from the brilliant results at Nurburgring, the cars have been further developed, improved and prepared and this was immediately evident as both cars went well from the off in the first session.
In a dulling but still dry morning session, all four drivers posted good times, with the 46 car of Darren and Joey picking up where it left off in Germany setting the early pace in the LMP2 class. Not to be outdone, Warren and Jonny gradually settled into their rhythm and began to reduce lap times dramatically.
Good humoured, though serious competition between the two sets of drivers as well as the other team’s is no doubt helping each car’s progress and the session eventually finished with car 45 third quickest in class with car 46 just over a second behind in 7th.
The encouraging performances looked like bringing more in the second free practice session, but as sure as a fully dry day had been forecast, it poured down and the second session was pretty much a wash out.
Still, if this was the start of the season – Embassy would see it as a fabulous beginning.
Team Principal Jonathan France said:
“I was always convinced we had the package to challenge at the front of the LMP2 grid, it was just a matter of finding the set-up and avoiding bad luck. We have clearly turned a corner at Nurburgring and I feel that from this point, we can only get stronger. I am looking forward to this weekend very much and hopefully it will springboard us into a successful winter testing schedule and a much more competitive 2009.”
