IMSA Performance Matmut travelled to Paul Ricard last weekend hoping to make amends for their disappointing previous GT Open round at Brands Hatch. But unfortunately history was destined to repeat itself for the Normandy-based team who, after a solid opening race, were powerless to prevent destiny and other cars from conspiring against their Porsche 911 GT3 RSR’s challenge. As in Britain, the squad’s unchanged points tally following race two fails to reflect either the team’s performance or justified championship ambitions.
Bright sunshine and a light breeze greeted the drivers as they headed for the starting grid before the weekend’s first GT Open race at the French venue. When the lights went out, Patrick Pilet maintained seventh place before immediately challenging the Manthey Racing Porsche ahead. Indeed, only a few attempts were necessary for the Frenchman to overtake Marco Holzer.
Having moved up to sixth, Pilet was now homing in on Philipp Peter. After quickly catching him, Pilet pulled off a textbook move that saw the IMSA Performance Matmut Porsche 911 GT3 RSR dive out of the slipstream down the main straight, pull alongside and finally outbrake the Kessel Racing Ferrari into the corner.
Running fourth as early as lap two, Pillet continued to push hard and soon had the gap to third place man Miguel Ramos down to just seven tenths. Time and again the Matmut-liveried Porsche attempted to intimidate its opponent down the back straight, albeit without finding an opening. Running several laps at that pace however had a significant effect on tyre performance, to the point that the #16 car fell back into the clutches of Peter who eventually re-passed.
On lap 16 Pilet pitted from fifth for the team’s mandatory driver change that saw Raymond Narac take the wheel and equipped with fresh tyres, before re-joining sixth. Immediately on the pace, the owner/driver was soon challenging the Kessel Racing Ferrari which now had Michael Broniszewski aboard. A great scrap duly ensued before the Frenchman eventually pulled off a perfectly executed move at the chicane. Although entertaining, the pair’s battle had also allowed Nick Tandy’s Manthey Racing Porsche to claw its way back into contention, and it wasn’t long before Narac had to concede the place back, leaving IMSA Performance Matmut to come home sixth.
That great performance allowed the team to hope for an even better result in race two, especially given the benefit of carrying no pit-stop handicap. Unfortunately that relied on avoiding the attentions of the #19 VO Racing Corvette which, in the hands of Diederich Sijthoff, attempted an impossible move on Narac when approaching Bendor corner after the double right of Beausset. The ensuing contact ended the team’s race after just two laps.
Franck Rava: “What can I say? We have endured a complicated weekend. In terms of performance we are right up there and getting everything out of the Porsche. You only have to compare it to the other 911 GT3 RSRs entered! But we were hampered by a racing incident and, in addition to this, tyre issues that disrupted our progress all weekend. We are losing a lot in that battle. In order to win the championship we have to score in each race, which was not the case either at Brands Hatch or here in Le Castellet. We can only continue working hard to have the best possible car for the next three rounds and hope that we will be spared bad luck.”
Raymond Narac: “This event leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Certainly, I would have preferred to finish race two and avoid the same scenario as Brands Hatch. But this is motorsport with its unknowns and uncertainties. It would also have been better to run a camber set-up compatible with the Porsche’s characteristics, but on this circuit the Dunlop tyres worked less well with them than anywhere else. So we had to follow the tyre manufacturer’s recommendations and adopt a peculiar set-up. This was definitely less competitive but at least the car is safe and could get through the race. During practice, Patrick destroyed a tyre using our basic set-up. The Signes corner and Beausset section should be taken flat-out and the tyres could not cope with it. But while the set-up undoubtedly cost us in terms of performance, it does not explain why the Aston Martin is 7km/h faster along the pit-straight than us! We lost at least one second over a full lap. I don’t know if that comes from the balance of performance but the gap seems to be very noticeable. In the end it was a bad weekend. Thankfully the championship is a long one and we have several races left in order to try and clinch it, which remains the objective.”
Source : IMSA Performance Matmut