Audi has not only won at the 2012 Le Mans 24 Hour, but they’ve taken 2nd, 3rd and 5th places too in the diesel hybrid R18 e-Tron.
The winning Audi R18 e-Tron was the first hybrid car to win at Le Mans and was brilliantly driven by Marcel Fässler (Swiss), André Lotterer (German) and Benoît Tréluyer (French).
Their win was helped by an early mishap for Toyota, but for the hybrid e-Trons to take 1st and 2nd and the diesel Audi’s 3rd and 5th is still stunning.
The only real competition for Audi this year came from Toyota which was leading until a coming together with the Nissan DeltaWing (which was almost as high profile as Audi in the run up to Le Mans) pushing the Toyota way down the running order and ending the Nissan DeltWing’s Le Mans outing.
No one can take away from Audi their dominance of Le Mans in recent years, but it seems a bit sad that one team – a very deserving team, no question – can dominate such a historic race.
Surely it’s time for other manufacturer teams to devote the budget to provide real competition for Audi? Perhaps Nissan’s new-found interest in quick cars and the DeltaWing project will encourage them to devote more budget to Le Mans in future, and Toyota’s certainly making the effort and could prove real competition next year.
Still, well done Audi. We just hope it’s tougher in 2013.
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