I’m taking a break, catching my breath for a few moments. I’m at the annual Audi fitness training session this week on the German/Austrian border. I had left home in absolutely torrential rain in the south of France, certainly not Cote d’Azur sunshine as we normally associate with the region.

It’s been a busy few weeks. I haven’t had a lot of time to think about it. The year started out at the Autosport International in Birmingham, which is the annual ‘kick-off’ of the season for me as it’s turned out to be and also for a lot of racing drivers, team personnel and fans.

After that it was a quick turnaround and off to America for our first test of the year. This was at Sebring and was an endurance test predominately to get some mileage and to understand the car a little bit more and to verify some of the work we were doing with our partners, like Michelin for example.

It was very helpful to get the cobwebs dusted off for all the engineers, the mechanics, and all the drivers. It wasn’t that long since our previous test but it is nice to see the New Year on the calendar and to get stuck back into it after the excesses of Christmas if you like.

But Sebring was not very kind to us in so far as the weather was a bit too Scottish at times. There was a lot of rain and it was a lot colder than what we would have expected but then I have been to Florida in January before and seen freezing temperatures, so at least this time we didn’t have to have too many layers of clothing. 

I was pleased with the way the test went. We had a good run and learnt a bit. It was good meeting up with the new Audi sports-prototype drivers too. New signings Marcel Fässler, André Lotterer and Benoît Treluyer had their first runs in the Audi R15 TDI. The car we used at Sebring was an interim model.

Lucas Luhr will be reserve driver for us at Le Mans this year while a total of five Audi prototypes will compete at Le Mans with the privateer Kolles team running their two Audi R10 TDI cars. Meanwhile Marco Werner will race the Audi R8 LMS. Congratulations are in order to Mike Rockenfeller who arrived at Sebring having just won the Daytona 24 Hours.

Fellow Scot Marino Franchitti was at Sebring having a blast in the Acura LMP2 car because he has now changed to the Highcroft Team. It was nice to see Marino diving into the hairpin and really getting on it coming through there and also into Turn 17.

Sadly we are not going to be at Sebring for the 12 Hour race next month.  Previously we’d used the Sebring race and the following days endurance tests as a good set-up for Le Mans. Unfortunately this year it is changing a bit.

I’ve now got very few weekends at home and hardly any weeks in the coming months when I’m not travelling or testing, or doing promotional work. I’ll update you on how this week went and other news very soon . . .

Source : Allan McNish