Masters Endurance Legends Series*

[Speedblood]

I saw the first of the 2 races at Imola this weekend just gone, sadly not a massive amount of cars but thoroughly entertaining none the less. Plus a good amount of nostalgia and engine noises...

Alex Kapadia in the ex SMP Oreca 03 was quickest all weekend but it still led to some good racing.

The Peugeot 908 (V12 edition) was looking good until a spin near the end of qualifying. Coming out of the last corner and tagged the wall with the rear. and didn't emerge for the rest of the weekend.

The ex Dyson Lola of Steve Tandy was looking good as well, a faster pitstop put him in front of Kapadia who slowly caught Tandy and passed him with a few laps to go.

There was a great battle foe 3rd between the Creation of Gareth Evans, the Audi R8 of Travis Engen and LMPC of Freiser (which must have had it's silencers removed as it made a lovely throaty sound!)

The 458 GTE was the quickest GT car on track but was plagued by gearbox issues, but lovely to hear it's shrill as it went past. The 2 Aston DBR9's sounded SO lovely as well, makes me miss GT1 even more. The Venturi sadly didn't get much running but certainly looked lovely having never seen one in the flesh.

Surprisingly attrition hit the newer Oreca 03 LMP2 cars (although the Pilbeam, Courage-Oreca LC75 and Lucchini did as well but maybe this is perhaps in keeping with period...)
Those of us in the grandstand gave the Courage-Oreca team a cheer when they finally got it into the race about 5 laps down! Lots of running back and forth attempting bump starts.

Mike Newton ran well in his MG Lola, closely followed by the ex Kolles Lola LMP2 as well which provided much needed variety from the Orecas.

Sadly had to leave before Sundays race but hopefully more will come out for the Brands Hatch round as the variety and race length is just right for these cars.

[Speedblood]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXAnrO6j7cQ
Onboard from Nigel Greensall in the Riley & Scott chasing Martin Short's Dallara at Brands Hatch.



Again not a huge amount of cars at the weekends races but some nice variety, Rui Aguas was flying in the 2011 Peugeot 908, the Riley & Scott and Dallara as above sounded fantastic, good battles among the P2 cars.
Just needs a few more cars on track. Hopefully the French GP support and Silverstone classic will bring them out.

[BertMk2]

Originally Posted by Speedblood

Again not a huge amount of cars at the weekends races but some nice variety, Rui Aguas was flying in the 2011 Peugeot 908, the Riley & Scott and Dallara as above sounded fantastic, good battles among the P2 cars.
Just needs a few more cars on track. Hopefully the French GP support and Silverstone classic will bring them out.

A few more cars out there would be nice but I thought it was great anyway! The Dallara with the Judd V10 sounded superb - proper howl! The 908s were really impressive too - the lap times they were putting in were incredible. It's really good to see these cars out and racing rather than being tucked away in a collection somewhere. The only disappointment really was the relative lack of pace of the R8.

[Graham Goodwin]

Understand a big grid is expected for the Paul Ricard French GP support race

[Giba]

Originally Posted by Graham Goodwin

Understand a big grid is expected for the Paul Ricard French GP support race

Fantastic news Graham, probably looking forward to that race more than the F1 that weekend!

[Speedblood]

Originally Posted by BertMk2

A few more cars out there would be nice but I thought it was great anyway! The Dallara with the Judd V10 sounded superb - proper howl! The 908s were really impressive too - the lap times they were putting in were incredible. It's really good to see these cars out and racing rather than being tucked away in a collection somewhere. The only disappointment really was the relative lack of pace of the R8.

For the dozen cars or so it was fantastic racing, lots going on and the longer pitstops for pro drivers made it a lot of fun!
Just could have done with at least half a dozen GT cars to give some bigger variety.

Originally Posted by Graham Goodwin

Understand a big grid is expected for the Paul Ricard French GP support race

Excellent, please keep us updated with any news you hear!

[BertMk2]

Originally Posted by Speedblood

For the dozen cars or so it was fantastic racing, lots going on and the longer pitstops for pro drivers made it a lot of fun!
Just could have done with at least half a dozen GT cars to give some bigger variety.

Agreed, you can get away with having a small grid when the cars are as impressive as that and the racing is still good. I assume the Porsche 911 GT3 didn't run in the races as there was nobody for it to play with. It's a shame the GT2 Aston wasn't there (and like you say some more GT cars to bulk out the grid a bit). I'm not sure a grid full of GT3 cars would be good for the series though - there are plenty of other places they can run so it would be good to keep this for the more exotic stuff.

[Speedblood]

Originally Posted by BertMk2

Agreed, you can get away with having a small grid when the cars are as impressive as that and the racing is still good. I assume the Porsche 911 GT3 didn't run in the races as there was nobody for it to play with. It's a shame the GT2 Aston wasn't there (and like you say some more GT cars to bulk out the grid a bit). I'm not sure a grid full of GT3 cars would be good for the series though - there are plenty of other places they can run so it would be good to keep this for the more exotic stuff.

Luckily Brands isn't the longest lap either so they were never too far apart.
It was in the garages but never headed out on track sadly. I had my license handy if they needed a driver...
A few old GTE/GT2 cars would definitely have been nice but would have been even more great to see the DBR9's/550/GTSR GT1's that appeared in the earlier races. Fingers crossed they make it out for more rounds. Only seen 1 GT3 car appear but I agree they shouldn't need to appear. Plenty of series around for them!

[airbusA346]

Originally Posted by BertMk2

Agreed, you can get away with having a small grid when the cars are as impressive as that and the racing is still good. I assume the Porsche 911 GT3 didn't run in the races as there was nobody for it to play with. It's a shame the GT2 Aston wasn't there (and like you say some more GT cars to bulk out the grid a bit). I'm not sure a grid full of GT3 cars would be good for the series though - there are plenty of other places they can run so it would be good to keep this for the more exotic stuff.

Both of the GT2 cars had technical issues which stopped them from racing.

[Juntos]

Originally Posted by airbusA346

Both of the GT2 cars had technical issues which stopped them from racing.

Poor maintenance or simply age?

[broadrun96]

Originally Posted by BertMk2

The only disappointment really was the relative lack of pace of the R8.

Crazy considering he had usually run that R8 at The Mitty and it often wasn't fair at all. But only a few times did he have a Pescarolo or Penske RS Spyder to play with. Often just much older cars. Sadly as he was at Spa we only had an old Dyson Lola running that kind of pace until it went WOOSH as turbo AERs are prone to do.

Sent from my SM-G955U1 using Tapatalk

[Giba]

Any news on the entry list for the Paul Ricard round this weekend?

[Speedblood]

According to the provisional list on masters historic site.

Prototypes - Audi R8, Peugeot 908x, Courage LC75, 2x Oreca FLM, 2x Oreca 03, Morgan-Pescarolo, Lola B2K40, Lola Lotus LMP2, Emmanuel Collard in what looks like the ex JRM HPD ARX-03a and a Ferrari 333sp!

GT- Maserati MC12, Porsche 911 GT3RSR, Toyota Supra BiTurbo, Dodge Viper GTS-R, Ferrari F40 GTE, 2x Ferrari 360, 2x Ferrari F430 (one driven by Adrian and Harrison Newey), Ferrari 550 GT1 and (see the pattern here...) 2x Ferrari 458 GTE

Looks a nice variety!

[Giba]

Brilliant line up that, hope the hot weather conditions over here doesn't cause too many issues for the cars

[tux]

Check out the entry list for the Le Mans Classic round.
CRAZY!

http://www.lemansclassic.com/wp-cont...-gel-entry.pdf

[joeb]

Originally Posted by tux

Check out the entry list for the Le Mans Classic round.
CRAZY!

http://www.lemansclassic.com/wp-cont...-gel-entry.pdf

Wow! that looks like it will be great to watch! There is a Toyota GT-One, does that normally run in these types of events?

[Juntos]

This Toyota GT-One belongs to who?

[Mike Bell]

Originally Posted by tux

Check out the entry list for the Le Mans Classic round.
CRAZY!

http://www.lemansclassic.com/wp-cont...-gel-entry.pdf

For the sake of accuracy, the Le Mans Classic grid is Peter Auto ‘Global Endurance Legends’, not Masters version. The GEL appearances up to now have been demonstrations, not races, but would guess some cars do PA and Masters......

[Willmaz223]

Originally Posted by Mike Bell

For the sake of accuracy, the Le Mans Classic grid is Peter Auto ‘Global Endurance Legends’, not Masters version. The GEL appearances up to now have been demonstrations, not races, but would guess some cars do PA and Masters......

That wouod have beein interesting if that had been a race although the big attraction such as the Bentley and Toyota probably wouldn't have raced for obvious reasons

[Speedblood]

Silverstone Classic Masters Endurance Legends races



Race 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1fmbCPjlpM


Race 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYVltYZjp5w

[Willmaz223]

The best grid the series has got so far.

My last comment on the Bentley was proved wrong .

28 cars which is good.Speed difference between the 908s and the Aston GT4s was frightening.

Last round at Spa.Looking forward to that one.

[8en]

With some of the new names on the Spa 6 Hours list, fingers crossed for some additional entires.

[Deleted]

In the current dismal world of bop and spec, and with the amazing array of machinery this period provided, this probably would be my favorite series in the world right now. If I could just watch all of it...

But I guess even one TV-covered event is better than nothing. Amazing cars with headlights blazing, no BS

[Mike Bell]

I presume you’re not in a position to go to race meetings and watch live, then.

The ‘Aston Martin Masters Endurance Legends’ series (as it is now called) is run by Masters Historic Racing, and as far as I know they don’t have the wherewithal / funds / whatever to have their races recorded. If they are televised or put on YouTube, it’s usually because the particular event organiser has arranged it, or has a deal with a TV company. In this instance ITV4 in the UK.

Masters also run an Endurance Legends series in N America, alongside their HF1 over there, so some of those events may get recorded. The last 2 weekends they have been racing at Laguna Seca during the Monterey Reunion, so worth searching for coverage of that.

The other European organiser running similar cars, Peter Auto with their ‘Endurance Racing Legends’, have a YouTube channel, but I don’t think complete races are on there. Seems to be highlights mostly. They will racing at Monza next month, so again, keep an eye out for coverage. Their recent meeting from the Hungaroring was completely televised by a Hungarian TV company, but the ‘Legends’ were not racing at that event.

[Deleted]

Unfortunately no ability to fly off here from Finland, no, unless for holiday (for which I don't have the money anyway). Anyway yes upon the launch of this series, IIRC Graham Goodwin was saying somewhere he was going to inquiry Nick Minassian on whether or not there would be coverage along the way, but my memory might fail me on that one. It is understandable why there isn't any apart from these one-offs but it's a shame still, maybe some day. I'm still hoping them to get the LM Saturday support slot some day

Yes the Monterey historics have been live on IMSAtv this weekend, well hopefully eventually uploaded. Nice to see the old GT1 Corvette entered, both C5-R and C6.R