FERRARI WINS SANDOWN BUT LAMBORGHINI TAKES THE TITLE

The Ferrari team of Nick O'Halloran and Alan Simonsen took out the Sandown GT classic last weekend. Held over two one hour heats the black Ferrari crossed the line over 16 seconds ahead of the Viper of Ross Lilley and former Nations Cup Champion Greg Crick. Tony Quinn making his debut in the ex Peter Hackett Aston Martin DBRS9 led the race at various times but fell back to third late in the race. The Lamborghini team of Ted Huglin and John Bowe came through to finish fourth with former F1 driver Ivan Capelli impressing everybody with his speed in the Maserati Trofero. Max Twigg in a Porsche GT3 Cup Car was sixth to take out Class B over the team of Michael Locisano and Marc Cini with high profile Hollywood actor Eric Bana also in a Porsche in third. Only 13 cars finished the race which was dealt a blow on Friday when the cars of Championship Contender John Kaias and Kim Bourke came together during private practice. With Kaias out Mark Eddy in the Lamborghini became the Australian National GT Champion after a seventh place finish.

BIG DAY FOR NISSAN AT AUTOPOLIS SUPER-GT

The Nissan GT-R of Satoshi Motoyama and Benoit Treluyer, won Kyushu 300, Round 8 of the Autobacs SUPER GT series at the Autopolis in Japan.  Starting from pole position lead driver Benoit Treluyer, made a great start to open up a significant lead. Co-driver Motoyama took over for the second half of the race and from then on was never threatened. The win was the team's third of the season but their first since way back in round two. They now lead the series outright with one round remaining.

RECORD ENTRY FOR HISTORIC SANDOWN

One of the highlights of the Victorian motor racing year  the VACC Historic Sandown on November 7-9 just got even better with the news that almost 360 cars have entered the event potentially equalling the record for the meeting. Despite the current economic crisis that has gripped the globe growth has occurred in all categories, with more than 20 Formula 5000s now confirmed for the VACC Trophy races, along with nearly 60 historic touring cars, and 70 classic and high performance cars spanning the history of the automobile have entered the popular Regularity (average speed) events.

ACO & ALMS WORKING TOGETHER ON LE MANS’ ASIAN PUSH

Le Mans organisers the Automobile Club de l'Ouest ACO and IMSA the organisers of the American Le Mans series will work together to expand the sport into Asia. Speaking on Radio Le Mans during the Petit Le Mans, ALMS founder Dr Don Panoz said that the dream of expanding the series in to the Asian region that began with the Race of a Thousand years in Adelaide was now fully back on the agenda and that his IMSA group would work with series owners the ACO to make the series a success. “We were already to go with a race in Malaysia back in 2001 but of course that was right after 9/11” said Dr Panoz. “nobody could fly anywhere and the race was cancelled.”

PEUGEOT ON POLE FOR PETIT LE MANS

Puegeot's single car entry will start from pole for the 2008 Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta. Stephane Sarrazin's time of 1:06.242 (138.039 mph) just edged out the Audi Sport North America's R10 of  Allan McNish by 0.085 seconds to set up another classic confrontation between the two giants of international sports prototype racing. “We are very happy,“ said Sarrazin, who also captured pole position at the 24 Hours of Le Mans the last two years for Peugeot. “It is very good for us and the team. We will focus now on a good start and a long race for tomorrow. It is a different target now than Sebring (in March). We were a newer car then and we did not finish. Then we advanced at Le Mans, so now we have even more time with the car.“ The rapid improvement in Le Mans racing was clearly evident as in the  top 15 qualifiers were all under Marco Werner's pole-winning time of 1:08.906 (132.703 mph) from 2006, with Sarrazin 2.564 seconds under. Werner, himself qualified third in the second of the Audi R10 TDIs at 1:06.818 (136.849 mph). Penske Racing's Ryan Briscoe led a Porsche sweep of the top three qualifying positions in LMP2. Briscoe made a triumphant return to Road Atlanta with a class-record pole run of 1:07.061 (136.353 mph) in one of Penske's three Porsche RS Spyders that he will share with two-time Indianapolis 500 winner Helio Castroneves.

NEW CORVETTES JOIN THE AUSSIE GT PARTY

Chevrolet will join the field for the steadily improving Australian GT championship with the news that both Neil  Bryson & Paul Freestone will be running Corvette's at Sandown in November. Bryson's car is the ex Ken James yellow machine imported from the Speed GT challenge in the USA but never run down under, the car will be prepared by Melbourne sportscar specialists Jocaro.  The car will run in the GT challenge class as it is not fully compliant with the series FIA GT3 specs. Freestone, who competed regularly in production car racing in the 90's in a Lotus and at the Calder Park Thunderdome will run his Corvette in the Production class.

PORSCHE JOIN AUSSIE GT REVIVAL

Porsche will make a challenge to the 2009 the Australian GT Championship following the successful testing of a brand new GT3 997 Cup S model at Sydney's Eastern Creek Raceway. The latest GT3 spec Porsche model will join the ever increasing GT field and and based on the times set during the test the car will be a genuine threat in the GT Championship division. The 997 Cup S will be the first current model Porsche to race in the series in several years due to a controversial ban in the 997 GT3 Cup Car by CAMS in order to protect the Carrera Cup series. One of only fifteen cars produced and the first to arrive in Australia, the Porsche GT3 997 Cup S has all the necessary ingredients to compete with the Gallardo GT3 model Lamborghini, Aston Martin DBRS9, and Ferrari 430 GT3 that have been the ‘gun’ machines in this year’s Australian GT Championship.

ONE IS THE LONELIEST NUMBER

The final round of the Le Mans Series at Silverstone has taken it's toll on Peugeot's campaign for the Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta. The company have been forced to scale back their assault on the race to only one-car following accidents at the Silverstone race two weeks ago. Peugeot Sport Director Michel Barge said that despite running only the one car that it was still important for Peugeot to take part in order for the team and the technical department to gain even more experience.

ALMS QUALIFYING FROM MOSPORT from SPEEDTV.COM

IDE LOSES POLE WITH ENGINE CHANGE

Despite setting the fastest time in the qualifying, the Honda NSX driven by Yuji Ide won't be on pole for round six of the 2008 Autobacs SUPER GT, the 37th International Pokka 1000Km at Suzuka. Pole position for the race has instead been awarded to the second fastest qualifier, the Nissan GT-R of Krumm/Yanagidaand D.Schwager.