After taking the pole position on Friday afternoon, the Audi R8 LMS ultra driven by Juan Cruz Álvarez, William Paul, Zoltan Fekete, Dominik Fekete and Heino Frederiksen fought to the finish in a 24-hour challenge with hot track temperatures. Drivex suffered a burst of the left rear tire twice. Due to their tireless work over the entire race, they were rewarded with a 7th place finish in A6-Pro.
Le Castellet, 19 July 2016. Drivex expected a tough challenge at the Paul Ricard circuit, which is close to the French Riviera. The 24 hours of Paul Ricard, with hot temperatures and an impressive entry list, saw the Drivex-entered Audi R8 LMS ultra driven by Juan Cruz Álvarez, William Paul, Zoltan Fekete, Dominik Fekete and Heino Frederiksen played a leading role from the very beginning. Argentina´s Cruz Álvarez clinched pole position on Friday but nothing could be taken for granted ahead of a 24-hour race.
The French marathon kicked off at 14.30 on Saturday with Cruz Álvarez on driving duty for the first stint. Despite an ABS sensor issue, the Arrecifes-born driver displayed a sensational performance over the first and a half hour and battled for podium with seasoned drivers such as Lance David Arnold, Matteo Malucelli, Joe Osborne or Bernd Schneider. Unfortunately, early-race issues hit the team with the first burst of the left rear tire. It forced the first long and non scheduled pit stop as it damaged car suspension. The repairs were made promptly and the car rejoined the race with a few laps down and with the scheduled sequence on driver changes.
Unfortunately, car problems continued to follow Drivex. Another left-rear tire burst and engine mounts issues during the night hours brought the car back to the pits again for long pit stops. From then on Drivex drivers, perfectly backed by engineers and mechanics, made it to the finish after completing 439 laps around Paul Ricard. Besides, the Audi R8 LMS ultra racing under the Drivex banner classified 7th in class.
Miguel Ángel de Castro: “It was an extremely tough race for all us. Lady Luck wasn´t on our side and after claiming Friday´s pole position, our race has been uphill all the way. The first tire burst damaged suspension and we also think it affected other mechanical parts. Later in the race, we suffered another tire burst, always the left-rear. Other teams also had the same problems. Hankook should focus to work on it because it is serious issues. The problem with engine mounts came also completely out of the blue because they were new ones. But anyway and after so many problems, at least we reached our minimum aim of finishing the race. On the whole, everyone did a great work. Juan claimed an amazing pole position on Friday. William´s performance was absolutely superb and he is making steady progress. His performance at Paul Ricard was sensational. Zoltan was also brilliant on his first appearance for us. He proved to be quick, professional and had a great learning curve. Dominik also made progress over the race and despite his youth he was particularly fast at night. Heino was making his debut with this kind of GT3 cars. He still has a long way to go and we expect to help him to improve as fast as possible.”