Dr Wolfgang Ullrich took a moment or two to bring DSC up to speed on progress with the rebuild of the team’s #1 Audi R18 e-tron quattro, the team’s third full rebuild around a replacement tub since two days ago!
The car missed FP3 and will also miss qualifying as Audi sensibly opted to rest their crew overnight and rebuild the car today, remembering of course that the crew will be expected to be on top form for a 6 hour race tomorrow!
“It has never happened before but the team always pull together and have done fantastic work here again.
“All of the damage is easily repairable, but just not here! We think we know what has been causing it, it seems to be a result of the particular configuration of the circuit and the kerbs, usually the kerbs when they are this flat, pass between the the wheels but here it seems to be different and it raises the car on one side.
“For 2015 we will try to catch up but that isn’t going to be easy. With our chosen technology we have a relatively heavy powertrain and that means we are more limited in the size of our hybrid.
“At present there is no prospect of a change in the balance between the various solutions but there is always the possibility of a change when you homologate a new car.
And what are we to expect from Audi in 2015, Porsche say they will have a new car, no carry over but to the same concept as the 2014 919, Toyota promise an evolution of their current technology?
“It will be an evolution of our current car, and it will be hard, very hard next year but as always we will fight.”
