After their victory at the1000km of Silverstone, Team ORECA-Matmut-AIM had chosen to cross the Atlantic to prepare for the 2010 Le Mans 24 Hours and to compare themselves to Acura. At the conclusion of a Petit Le Mans interrupted at the end of the fifth hour due to a persistent rain, the team and its drivers – Nicolas Lapierre, Romain Dumas and Olivier Panis – reached the goals set out by Hugues de Chaunac.  Despite difficult conditions, the three drivers had an excellent showing, regularly dominating the two Acuras.  For their first time at this difficult track, the ORECA finished in fifth place: first of the petrol-powered prototypes, only dominated by Peugeot and Audi.

    

Race action:
Starting sixth, Nicolas Lapierre kept his position under a light rain, following the De Ferran Motorsports Acura, before pitting earlier for new tyres. He leaves the pits just under two laps behind after being slowed by another competitor in pitlane. At the end of the first hour, the team decided to put on slick tyres and proves to be a good choice as the drying track helps Nicolas to climb from 10th to fifth place as he pushes and the team manages the yellow flags well. As Romain Dumas takes over at the wheel, his goal is to widen the gap between him and the Highcroft Acura. Mission accomplished as he puts Scott Sharp a lap down and even when the rain makes it’s appearance, the ORECA 01 stays competitive.  But as the rain gets harder and soon after Oliver Panis had taken over, the red flag flies 11 minutes before the halfway point.  The event would not restart..

Hugues de Chaunac :  “The race unfortunately ended sooner than scheduled due to the weather, but for us, it was a positive race. We came here to measure ourselves against Acura and we won our fifth place on the track.  It’s the proof that the team worked well. The first objective was to avoid errors.  This was reached as the ORECA 01 was one of the only cars not to commit one. Our second objective was the battle with Acura.  We are ahead of these two cars, which is good. On a track that we were learning, we showed some interesting things! Now we look ahead to the Asian Le Mans Series which is the next step to our Le Mans 2010 preparations.  We look forward to continuing our good end of season at this event.”