Less than two months before WTCC heads to the Nurbugring, Rob Huff and Tom Coronel reflect on the difficulty to apprehend a track like the Nordschleife...
mardi 31 mars 2015
Taking over from Valentino Rossi. By WTCC ace Stefano D’Aste
Motorbike racer turned FIA World Touring Car Championship event winner Stefano D’Aste has recalled the time when he took over Valentino Rossi’s ride.
D’Aste and Rossi raced together at 125cc level during the 1994 season before Cagiva signed D’Aste to replace Rossi for 1995 following the latter’s graduation to the 250cc category.
While Rossi went on to claim a succession of 500cc and MotoGP titles, D’Aste switched to four wheels, firstly in rallying before a successful move to car racing.
“When Valentino was a factory rider of Cagiva in 1994 I was a semi-factory rider,” remembers D’Aste. “I had the official parts but the bike from the year before from Valentino. Then when Valentino left 125 I signed a contact with Cagiva and got the place of Valentino. I used his bike before I got the evolution bike and because Valentino won the championship the year before they gave me number one.”
D’Aste recalls his time on two wheels with great fondness and likens the atmosphere in bike racing to the WTCC, which he’s backing contesting this season in a ALL-INK.com Münnich Motorsport Chevrolet.
“Many times we were together in the paddock having fun and doing silly things,” says D’Aste of Rossi. “We did some funny things with water guns and taking scooters off road, having great fun, which is how it is in the WTCC. I knew Valentino would be good and it’s great he’s back really very competitive now.”
WRC et WEC : Toyota confirme son double engagement / Toyota confirms two-pronged programme
L’arrivée de Toyota en Championnat du monde des Rallyes FIA ne remet pas en cause son engagement en Championnat du monde d’Endurance dans les trois ans à venir. Le premier constructeur mondial va donc mener de front deux programmes… Le Finlandais Teemu Suninen vient d’être confirmé pilote d’essais cette année.
Présent sur le circuit Paul Ricard pour le Prologue du championnat FIA WEC, Pascal Vasselon (Directeur technique de Toyota GmbH) a confirmé l’engagement de la marque en Endurance sur les trois prochaines années parallèlement à son retour en WRC en 2017.
Ces deux programmes seront menés par Toyota Motorsport GmbH (TMG) basé à Cologne (Allemagne), où des équipes distinctes sont en train d’être constituées. Comme en Endurance, TMG devrait s’appuyer sur la société Oreca pour mettre sur pied le programme WRC. En rallye, la structure varoise a remporté les titres de Champion du Monde Junior 2003 (Brice Tirabassi), de Champion d’Europe (Simon Jean-Joseph) 2004 et deux titres de Champion de France en 2002/03.
« Nous avons deux années pour développer la Toyota Yaris WRC et préparer notre retour », nous a dit Pascal Vasselon, qui revient dans une discipline dans laquelle il avait travaillé au développement des pneumatiques chez Michelin au début de sa carrière. Coïncidence, son alter ego chez Porsche en Endurance, Alex Hitzinger, a débuté sa carrière en rallye, au sein du Toyota Team Europe, en 1997 !
« Par rapport à l’Endurance, le rallye est un peu plus conservateur. Sans aller jusqu’à l’hybridation des voitures, nous avons essayé de proposer quelques évolutions technologiques en commission WRC, mais elles ont été rejetées. »
« En revanche, les relations entre ingénieurs et pilotes sont plus étroites en rallye, à tel point qu’on peut monter à côté d’eux dans la voiture pour se forger un avis, sans avoir toujours le « nez » dans les datas. C’est passionnant. ». L’an passé, TMG a recruté Cyrille Jourdan au poste d’ingénieur principal, châssis, recherche & développement en rallye.
Les trois pilotes de développement, Stéphane Sarrazin, Eric Camilli et Sebastian Lindholm, ont déjà parcouru de nombreux kilomètres d’essais sur asphalte, terre et neige. Ils seront rejoints cette année par le Finlandais Teemu Suninen (21 ans) qui a débuté en rallye il y a deux ans seulement, vainqueur du WRC-3 au dernier Rallye de Finlande.
« Le programme de développement va se poursuivre jusqu’en 2017. Pour l’heure, nous n’envisageons pas de participer à des rallyes WRC avant notre retour officiel. « Chez Toyota TMG, l’Endurance et le Rallye ont chacun leur budget », a confirmé Pascal Vasselon. « Il n’y a donc aucun risque pour qu’un programme remplace l’autre à court terme. »
Le président de Toyota TMG, Yoshiaki Kinoshita, sera remplacé par Toshio Sato le 1er avril. Ce changement à la tête du team ne remet pas en cause les engagements sportifs actuels et futurs de la marque.
Toyota’s decision to contest the FIA World Rally Championship has had no influence on the Japanese make’s commitment to world class endurance racing (FIA WEC) for the next three years. As a result, it will be the first volume carmaker to tackle two such major programmes in parallel.
Pascal Vasselon, the Technical Director of Toyota Motorsport GmbH (TMG), was at last weekend’s official pre-2015 WEC test at Le Castellet, France, where he confirmed the make’s commitment to endurance racing for the next three years in addition to its WRC comeback in 2017.
The programmes will be run by distinct operations at TMG in Cologne, Germany, in association with the French specialist Oreca, the team that helped Brice Tirabassi to Junior WRC success in 2003 and Simon Jean-Joseph to the 2004 European Rally Championship crown, plus French titles in 2002 and 2003.
“We’ve got two years to develop the Toyota Yaris WRC and prepare our return to rallying,” notes Vasselon who worked in the sport as tyre developer with Michelin at the beginning of his career. Coincidentally, Alex Hitzinger, his counterpart at Porsche Team (WEC), started his career with the Toyota Team Europe rally team in 1997!
“Compared with endurance racing, rallying is a little more conservative. Without going as far as running hybrid power, we have suggested some technological evolutions to the WRC Commission, but they were rejected. That said, the relationship between the drivers and the engineers is closer in rallying. You can actually sit alongside them to forge your own opinion rather than depend on analysing data. It’s absorbing!”
Last year, TMG recruited Cyrille Jourdan as Chief Engineer for the rally team, with responsibilities covering the chassis and R&D.
Development drivers Stéphane Sarrazin, Eric Camilli and Sebastian Lindholm have already clocked up a high number of kilometres on asphalt, gravel and snow. They will now be joined by Finnish youngster Teemu Suninen, 21, who won the WRC3 class at last August’s Rally Finland despite only making his debut two years ago.
“Our development work will continue until 2017. For the moment, we have no plans to compete in any WRC events before our official comeback. There are separate budgets for endurance racing and rallying at TMG, so there is no risk of one programme replacing the other in the short term.”
From tomorrow (April 1), Toyota TMG President Yoshiaki Kinoshita will be replaced by Toshio Sato.
This Tequila-powered Triumph has been stretched for the salt
Built for a reason, and for one reason only, this Triumph Thruxton-based ‘Salt Racer’ has its sights set on a new speed record at Lake Gardiner, South Australia, at the end of March…
Far from standard
Long and low-slung, the machine is the finished product from a team of bike-builders in Melbourne, Australia, who wanted to build a café-racer-inspired, land-speed bike – designed to go as fast as possible. With support from Triumph Australia, Peter Stevens Motorcycles led the project, the bike starting life as a factory-standard 2008 Triumph Thruxton. Ross Osborne from Supacustom was also heavily involved.
Power house
At the heart of this purpose-built speed machine is a heavily modified Thruxton motor. Bored to 1000cc by tuning specialist Andrew Hallam and running on alcohol-based fuel (ok, maybe not tequila, but methanol), it is expected to produce in excess of 100bhp. The stylish fuel tank and bodywork are made entirely from carbonfibre. Up front, a pair of forks from a Triumph 675 Daytona replace the originals, while at the rear an extended swingarm and high-performance twin dampers provide greater high-speed stability. If the bike's performance is anything near as good as its appearance, it's very likely that a record will be set in the currently 'open' DLRA 1000MF class.
Photos: TriumphSaltRacer.com
You can find many Triumph motorcycles for sale in the Classic Driver Market.
Inscription à :
Articles (Atom)