COVENTRY: Allan McNish, the Scottish racing driver sponsored by Graham, steered his diesel-engined Audi home in to third place the Le Mans 24 Hour race which ended on Sunday.
It could have been better for Mr McNish, who was driving the latest specification Audi R15 TDI with Tom Kristensen and Dindo Capello.
He had started sixth on the 55-car grid and was up to fourth when after almost 4hrs, co-driver Kristensen came across a slow-moving car which moved across in front of him.
He explained: "Tom had to take avoiding action of a slow, wounded car that drifted across on him. He ended up in the gravel having also lightly touched the guard rail. He was towed out of the trap and got the car back to the pits for repairs. In all we lost around three laps – the distance we finished behind our winning team-mates.
"The team's 1-2-3 finish is an unbelievable result because we didn't have the outright pace of Peugeot," commented Mr McNish. "But, Audi had the efficiency and reliability plus the team, structure, drivers and engineers that knew from experience, how to win here."
"I've not been involved in a Le Mans like this one in my 10 previous starts here! It turned on its head two or three times. The result of our car was obviously dictated by Tom's incident which was frustrating. But our fight back was intense and we can all be very proud – but that doesn't mean to say that we can forget about the performance of our 'French friends' as we now must focus on the Intercontinental Cup which begins at Silverstone in September."
The Graham team invited a number of key customers to experience the very special atmosphere of the 24-hour race. Ian Kenny, marketing director commentied: "The team and our guests had a fantastic time at Le Mans, capped by seeing Allan McNish mount the podium on Sunday afternoon. We now look forward to the Silverstone race in September where we hope many more of our customers will be able to experience the unique thrill of seeing the fastest cars in world racing in the UK."
