Dramatic Finish to American Le Mans Series Season

Gil de Ferran and Simon Pagenaud celebrate winning the ALMS Monterey Sports Car Championships at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway. (Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images)

The Monterey Sports Car Championships at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway on October 10, the final race of the 2009 American Le Mans Series, featured flat-out fighting between class leaders right to the finish line.

When the green flag fell, three different class championships were hanging on the outcome. Though two of them were decided before the race finished, the intensity of the racing didn’t slacken at all.

Le Mans Prototype 2 champion Adrian Fernandez chased Le Mans Prototype 1 runner-up Gil de Ferran right to the checkered flag, losing the race by less than a second, while a few cars back, GT2 champion Jörg Bergmeister bashed and banged through the final corner with Jan Magnusson to take the class win as Magnusson spun into the outside wall, wrecking his car.

Simon Pagenaud in the de Ferran Motorsports Acura ARX-02a leads Jon Field in the Intersport Lola B06/10 and David Brabham in the Patrön Highcroft Acura ARX-02a at the start of the ALMS Monterey Sports Car Championships at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway. (Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images)

Last Chance for the Two Prototype Drivers

The battle for the overall win was particularly poignant for the two leading drivers, because both of them knew Laguna Seca might be the final race of their careers.

Luis Diaz drives the Lowe's Fernandez Racing Acura ARX-01B during the ALMS Monterey Sports Car Championships at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway. (Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images)

Gil de Ferran announced his retirement as a driver at Mid-Ohio. He will remain on as team owner, but will no longer compete as a driver. Though he has come back from retirement once before, it seems unlikely that he would do so again. He has done everything he wanted as a driver, and now wants to exercise his expertise in team management.

Gil de Ferran said that while he was on the track, he was not thinking about this being his last race as a driver.

“We were very tight on fuel and the tires were gone as well, so it was very difficult to hang in there. We were using traffic as well as we could to try to save more fuel; believe me, there was no time to think about anyhting but staying up front.”

Gil de Ferran plunges through the Corkscrew at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway. (Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images)

Adrian Fernandez, a long-time rival of de Ferran going back to their IndyCar days, announced last month that due to a lack of sponsorship dollars, he will be closing down his team.

Fernandez is eager to drive and would like to expand his team, but Lowe’s said they would only fund an IndyCar effort with Adrian as driver, and Fernandez is not interested in driving in IndyCar, though he wants to compete there. So Fernandez has no contract for the 2010 season, despite being one of the most talented, professional, and successful team owners in the sport.

Knowing this might be their last race, the two Prototype drivers turned in inspired performances, with Fernandez pushing his lighter, less-powerful P2 Acura to faster laps than any other car on the track, while de Ferran used the greater power and torque of his heavier P1 Acura to keep Fernandez behind him.

With 23 minutes left in the race, Fernandez was able to outbrake de Ferran into Turn 11, and briefly took the lead; however, on the next corner de Ferran re-passed Fernandez.

Fernandez kept turning up the fuel mix as the race neared its finish, while de Ferran was forced to conserve fuel where he could. Fernandez stayed less than half a second behind consistently, but couldn’t get by the P1 Acura. When de Ferran crossed the finish line less than a second ahead of Fernandez, he had earned the race win with clean, hard racing.

Adrian Fernandez was not disappointed to lose to a competitor of de Ferran’s caliber.

“I didn’t have enough for him on the straights. We were very fast through the corners and I tried everything I could. Gil is a very good driver. We battled for many years in the old days. Today we just didn’t have enough. But it was a fantastic battle, and we almost made it."

The Corvette Racing Corvettes lead the rest of the GT field during the ALMS Monterey Sports Car Championships at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway. (Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images)

GT2: An Actual Fight to the Finish

The racing in GT2 was not not so clean. Jörg Bermeister and Jan Magnusson’s epic last-lap struggle, while exciting, was not in keeping with the driving standards set by the Americans Le Mans Series.

Bergmeister, driving the #45 Flying Lizard Porsche RSR, had already won the series, but he wanted to win the race. Jan Magnusson in the Corvette Racing Corvette C wanted equally to win, and he had a faster car. However, Bergmeister was ahead of him, and was doing everything the rules allowed to keep the Corvette from passing.

As the end of the race neared, Magnusson resorted to swerving onto pit lane to get past the Porsche, but the race stewards radioed to him that he had to give back the position, because he made the pass by using an illegal shortcut.

More frustrated than ever, Magnusson rammed Bergmeister coming into the final turn of the final lap. While Bergmeister struggled to control his car, Magnusson pushed past on the inside.

Unwilling to be beaten by such tactics, Bergmeister responded by pushing Magnusson towards the inside wall. Magnusson had to turn sharply to avoid hitting the wall, and this sent him spinning across the track and headfirst into the outside wall with enough force to lift the back of the car completely off the track.

“I was clear ahead going into the last corner, and he just drilled me,” Jörg Bergmeister explained. “I didn’t want it to end like that but he started it and I wasn’t giving that one away.”

Magnusson was not injured, and the stewards chose not to penalize the drivers. Hopefully, something will be said after the season ends; this kind of driving, while accepted in some series, has no place in the American Le Mans Series.

[Editor's Note: On Monday, October 12, IMSA, the series governing body, issued a minimum two-race probabtion to both drivers. If either is inviolved in any incidents in the first two races of 2010 (or longer as IMSA deems) they will be suspended for two race (or longer.)] 

David Brabham and team owner Duncan Dayton celebrate winning the 2009 ALMS P1 Championship during the race at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway. (Patron Highcröft Racing)

The Championships

David Brabham and Scott Sharp of the the Patrón Highcroft Racing team took the P1 championship on lap 137; they were far enough ahead on points that they only needed to finish 70% of the race to be qualified as official participants and take the title.

"I can’t say enough about the Patron Highcroft Racing Team, to win the championship like we did … unbelievable,” said David Brabham after the race. “Each and every member of this team, even those back at the shop did their bit, and I’m so proud of the whole team.  

Jim Hall drives his #66 Chaparral 2E ahead of Gil de Ferran in the #66 Chaparral during a demonstration lap at Mazda Laguna Seca Raceway. Veteran racer and designer Jim Hall gave de Ferran his start in racing. (Jonathan Ferrey/Getty Images)

"To race against Gil and the de Ferran Racing Team, they are absolute quality, so to beat them in the championship really means a lot. It shows how good this team is.”

Adrian Fernandez and Luis Diaz of Lowes-Fernandez Racing won the P2 title at Petit Le Mans on Sept. 26.

Jörg Bergmeister and Patrick Long of the Flying Lizard team won the GT2 championship when their nearest rival, Pierre Kaffer and Jaime Melo, retired with mechanical difficulty with fifty laps left to race.

The Challenge Cup title ended up going to the husband-and-wife team of Melanie and Martin Snow, despite their retiring early with engine problems. Their nearest competitors, Wesley Hoaglund and Bob Faieta, were disqualified after the race for not meeting minimum weight.

The American Le Mans Series 2010 season starts with the Twelve Hours of Sebring, on March 20, 2010. Please visit the Sebring international Raceway Web site for ticket information—and reserve rooms early; hotels in the area sell out quickly. Sebring attracts the biggest international racing teams, and never fails to get a capacity crowd.