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SALEEN S7-R & LAMBO MURCIÉLAGO R-GT |
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June 13, 2007 - The Saleen S7-R is raced in competition since 2001. Founded by Steve Saleen in the 1980s, his firm is best known for its Ford Mustang derived products. The S7-R however was the first own car, built up from the ground. The S7-R knew a stellar debut by winning its class at the 2001 Sebring 12 hours as raced by Ray Mallock of RML. But after that win the cars rarely managed to translate their extremely high torque in good racing results. Franz Konrad and Graham Nash met only reliability problems on racing the S7-R in 2004 and 2005. Only the car raced by the American Acemco Team could realise a couple of fine results. In 2006 Saleen increased its interest in motorsport and confined much more reliable racing units to Hughes de Chaunac of Team Oreca, and to Peter Zakowski of Zakspeed Racing. Better results followed immediately. The French Saleen won without problems the French FFSA championship. At the LMS the car won its class at the Spa 1000-kms and at the Jarama 1000-kms, finishing in the top-10 of both races. The German S7-R won two rounds of the FIA GT Series, was brought home at all rounds and finished in six races within the top-4. Another S7-R, sold to Shaun Balfe disappointed in the FIA GT Series by realising no better than two top-10 places. The other older Saleen, Acemco's, entered only the Sebring 12 hours, where it finished eleventh overall. In 2007 Zakspeed withdrew from FIA GT racing, whilst Oreca entered two cars in the LMS. One of them won its class at the Valencia 1000-kms. At the Le Mans Test Day the fastest S7-R was fourth in its class, only preceded by the two works Corvettes and one of the six Aston Martins. The #61 Box Racing Team S7-R finished at the two LMS rounds on its class podium, but was not invited for the Le Mans 24 hours. LMGT1 |
 Rear of the Team Oreca #54 Saleen S7-R seen at the 2007 Le Mans 24 hours |
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#54 Team Oreca Saleen S7-R at the 2007 Le Mans 24 hours |
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#55 Team Oreca Saleen S7-R at the 2007 Le Mans 24 hours |
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#55 Team Oreca Saleen S7-R as invited at the 2007 Le Mans 24 hours |
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The #61 Saleen 7-R, raced in the 2007 LMS by the Racing Box Team, was not selected for Le Mans, despite two class podiums at the two first LMS rounds. |
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In 1998 Lamborghini was taken over by Audi and things changed tho-roughly. In 2003 the Lamborghini Murciélago was launched at the Frank-furt Motorshow. Of a race prepped version, the R-GT, seven copies were sold, but one had to wait 2005 to see the first good results. At the Monza 1000-kms Peter Cox and Norman Simon were setting the pace until one hour before the finish, when an oil fire stopped the car on the long straight. In 2006 the R-GT scored its first racing victory: a seriously detuned R-GT won at Suzuka the first round of the Autobacs Super GT in GT300. Reiter Engineering entered the same year a couple of rounds of the FIA GT Series, scoring just as in 2005 two eighth places. This year however the Reiter Lambo scored its first overall win at the first round of the FIA GT Series at Zhuhai (with Christophe Bouchut and Stephan Mucke as drivers). That excellent result was confirmed in Bucharest, at the third round of the FIA GT series, where the same car finished as runner-up. At Le Mans JLOC shows with the normal version of its Lamborghini Murcié-lago R-GT (thus not the detuned GT300 version). At the Le Mans Test Day the car could not confirm the good results obtained by the sister cars of Reiter Engineering in the FIA GT Series. Indeed, the car clocked the one but last time in its class, only followed by the old Ferrari F550 Maranello of Convers Bank/MenX.
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#53 JLOC Lamborghini Murciélago R-GT as seen at the 2007 Le Mans 24 hours |
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