ART Grand Prix concluded its first season in the ELMS (European Le Mans Series) in fourth and fifth place in the overall team standings for the GTC class with a 5th position being achieved on the Estoril circuit by the crew of the McLaren MP4-12C No. 98. In the drivers’ championship, the drivers in the No. 98 (Kevin Korjus/Grégoire Demoustier/Yann Goudy) made the final 5th place while those in the No. 99 (Alex Brundle/Ricardo Gonzalez/Karim Ajlani), who were forced to retire in Estoril , were ranked 7th.
The fifth and final round of the 2014 ELMS championship was played out under the hot sun of the Portuguese Atlantic coast, Estoril. Respectively qualifying in second and sixth places on the grid, the ART Grand Prix McLaren MP4-12C, No. 98 and No. 99, saw the beginnings of what ended up being a difficult race roughly at one quarter distance. No. 98 had a trip across the gravel while No. 99 suffered a collision with a rival. The No. 98 lost 2 minutes overall, but was able to continue the race. However, the No. 99 suffered a broken front suspension and was forced to retire from the event after just 23 laps.
Falling to 11th place after his off track excursion, Gregoire Demoustier was into 10th place when he handed the baton to Yann Goudy after the first of the scheduled 4 hours of racing. Grégoire Demoustier, Kevin Korjus and Yann Goudy gradually made their way up to fifth place after some strong stints, but they had to forget about trying to catch the BMW and Ferrari ahead of them, who had taken off early in the race.
GREGOIRE DEMOUSTIER: “The car performed well on new tires, but it suffered a sharp degradation of rubber during the race. I made a small mistake at the beginning of my first stint, but the team remained focused on its goals. It was very hot in the cockpit and Estoril is a challenging circuit, but we got the best result we could hope for with this 5th place. ART Grand Prix made its debut in ELMS this year and has laid a good foundation for future seasons.”
KARIM AJLANI: “Finishing the season with an accident is frustrating and it does not reward the team for all their work. I did not expect to see a Ferrari attack me because I had already started to enter the curve. But, that’s racing. I am very happy to have joined such a professional team as strong as ART Grand Prix for my first full season in GT and I want to thank Frédéric Vasseur and Sebastien Philippe for their confidence. ART Grand Prix made me feel comfortable from the first race and we immediately obtained some very encouraging results. But we knew from the beginning that it would be difficult to aim for better than 4th place because of the balance of performance. Overall this is a great first season, very encouraging.”
SEBASTIEN PHILIPPE (ART Grand Prix Team Manager): “ART Grand Prix had good qualifications, especially with the No. 98 and Kevin Korjus, whose performance during his one lap was remarkable. We knew that the duration of a race of four hours, we would have struggled to keep this up and the off track excursion for the No. 98 was not too highly prejudicial. 5th place was the best that we could have hoped for and it rewarded the work completed by the entire team. Regarding the No. 99, we lost a lot of time due to the accident and we would not have been able to cover 70% of the race distance, which is the minimum allowed to score points. The car was damaged, its performance was not optimal and we preferred not to take any risks in regard to the safety of our drivers. The results of the first season for ART Grand Prix in ELMS is very positive with a podium and some very interesting results, despite the balance of performances that penalized us throughout the season. The team can be proud of their performances and the learning curve.”