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Seiji
Ara and Rinaldo Capello fulfilled a perfect double victory for
Audi. After nearly six hours they finished one lap behind their Audi colleagues
Davies and Herbert. Ara and Capello are fifth in the final driver point
standings. They are each one point down to their Audi colleagues Allan
McNish and Pierre Kaffer, who are third with 28 points each.
This was not a reason for big joy for McNish and his German team-mate
Kaffer because the double season winner went into the last LMES race in
2004 at Spa as championship leaders. But on the 23rd lap, Pierre Kaffer
could not avoid a collision with a slow and unaware backmarker. Back in
the pits the Audi R8 had to retire from the race. The race was –
typical for the challenging track at Spa – filled with changing
weather conditions and many safety car interruptions.
"Vorsprung durch Technik” proved all three Audi R8 with four
victories in all four races of the maiden LMES season. In two races, they
even managed a triple victory, the other two have been double victories.
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after the race
Rinaldo Capello (Audi Sport
Japan Team Goh / Audi R8 #5): "At the beginning everything was perfect.
But then we lost nearly two laps by unlucky manoeuvres of the safety car.
I think we should go back to the old rule, so that the safety car goes
in front of the leader and not somewhere in the middle of the field –
otherwise the race outcome can be unfair. We tried for our first LMES
victory here, but it did not work out, although we pushed to the very
end. But the season was fantastic for us – the highlight of course
winning at Le Mans.”
The result at Spa-Francorchamps
1 Davies/Herbert (Audi R8) 144 laps in 5hrs 58m 55.262s
2 Ara/Capello (Audi R8) - 1 lap
3 Minassian/Campbell-Walter (Zytek) - 5 laps
4 Frei/Hancock/Cochet (Courage) - 7 laps
5 Stack/Hignett/Collini (Zytek) - 8 laps
6 Erdos/Ramos/Newton (Lola-AER) - 8 laps
7 Bouchut/Lamy/Zacchia (Ferrari) - 12 laps
8 Belmondo/Gosselin/Eyckmans (Courage) - 15 laps
9 Ortelli/Collard (Porsche) - 15 laps
10 Enge/Pergl/Goueslard (Ferrari) - 15 laps
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