In today’s 77th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, won overall by Peugeot Sport, the Houston-based Risi Competizione team once again demonstrated its dominance in endurance GT racing by winning the GT2 class for the second year in succession with a two lap advantage over the second placed finisher, BMS Scuderia Italia. This is the fourth endurance win for the team owned by privateer Giuseppe Risi, and comes after 2008 Le Mans, 2008 Petit Le Mans and 2009 Sebring 12 Hours.
The Ferrari 430 GT of Jaime Melo, Mika Salo and Pierre Kaffer was not only joined on the podium by its sister Ferrari which finished third – crewed by Krohn Racing’s Tracy Krohn, Nic Jonsson and Eric van de Poele – but they led an astonishing Ferrari result which shows that nine of the ten Ferrari 430s entered in the race were classified in the top 11 places in class. Only a Spyker intruded in an all-Ferrari top ten.
In the year that the Italian marque celebrates the 60th Anniversary of its last overall win of the world’s most famous and sportscar race, it is a result that Ferrari’s President can be proud of. As official starter of this weekend’s 24 hour race, Luca di Montezemolo, made mention whilst at Le Mans of the very high level of competition between all automobile manufacturers entered in the race and of how much regard he had for the event.
The #82 Ferrari of Melo, Salo and Kaffer had a faultless race, with no mechanical worries, and were able to profit from a well prepared car, consistent and reliable Michelin tires, a superb driver line up which had the experience and skill to outlast many of their competitors in varying temperatures and track conditions, and a team which didn’t put a foot wrong throughout the entire 24 hours.
The only unscheduled pit stop was for an additional set of tires on Sunday morning at 0927 hrs. It was a similar story for the #83 Krohn green car which also only had one unscheduled pit stop for tires at 0109 hrs on Sunday morning. Both cars stopped 26 times during the twice round the clock event, and led the GT2 category from the sixth hour to the chequered flag.
Team Principal Giuseppe Risi was overwhelmed by what had been achieved: “This is a very special day; winning this again after what we did last year makes it even more so. To have ten Ferraris here and have two of our cars placed in the top three is a simply magnificent result. These are the best teams in the world who race here so it is extremely special to have achieved this outcome, and to have entered the history books as part of Ferrari’s racing folklore. I can’t say enough about it.”
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