Craft-Bamboo Racing ready for maiden Le Mans
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Craft-Bamboo Racing will make its 24 Hours of Le Mans debut this weekend (14-15 June) as it partners with Aston Martin Racing to run the Interush-liveried #99 V8 Vantage GTE in the highly-competitive GTE Pro class.
The team – a merger between experienced GT racing team Craft Asia and Bamboo Racing, well known for it’s World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) success – made it’s first foray into the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) at the start of this season. The 24 Hours of Le Mans is the centre-piece of the WEC calendar and counts for double points in the championship race.
Darryl O’Young (HK), who first raced in the 24 Hours of Le Mans last year, will be joined in the #99 Vantage GTE by Le Mans rookies Fernando Rees (BR) and Alex MacDowell (GB), and the trio is looking to be consistent and reliable in a bid to grab a place on the podium.
Experienced GT racer Darryl O’Young, who finished in second place in the GTE Am class last year commented: “We have a very good crew and I have two great team-mates but we have to realistic that this is a learning year for us as a team. At Le Mans, success is about keeping the car out of the garage and recording consistent lap times so that’s what we are aiming to do.”
Rees, who has raced in the WEC for two years, will make his competitive debut at Le Mans this weekend. Both he and British driver MacDowall completed the ten mandatory rookie testing laps two weeks ago at the official 24 Hours of Le Mans test session.
“Testing went well,” commented MacDowall. “We struggled to match the top speed of some of our competitors because of changes to our balance of performance earlier in the year but the team worked hard to made the necessary adjustments and we’re going into this race with a car we are very happy with.”
The 24 Hours of Le Mans is the word’s most famous endurance race and more than 250,000 fans travel to watch the 54 sportscars pound around the 13.6km long Circuit de la Sarthe.
“Racing at Le Mans is the pinnicle of sportscar racing,” commented Rees. “To be racing here is a dream come true and to be doing it in an Aston Martin with such a great team is incredible. I just can’t wait for the start of the race!”
The 24 Hours of Le Mans starts at 1500hrs on Saturday 14 June. Ahead of the race, there is a four-hour practice session on Wednesday at 1600hrs before the first of three qualifying sessions at 2200hrs. Qualifying sessions two and three take place at 1900hrs and 2200hrs on Thursday. Fans can watch the build-up and race on lemans-tv.com and via the Le Mans 24 Hours app (’24 Heures du Mans 2014’).
