On the road to Le Mans with Highcroft
The countdown to the world’s most famous endurance sportscar race has begun and I’m looking forward to my 17th outing at the 24 Hours of Le Mans on 12-13 June.
The last three years at Le Mans have been pretty amazing for me, with back-to-back GT1 class wins in 2007 and 2008, with Aston Martin Racing, and outright race victory with Team Peugeot last year.
My aim this year? To score a fourth consecutive win in three different classes as I contest LMP2 and help Highcroft Racing, the team I won the American Le Mans Series (ALMS) championship with last year, make their Le Mans debut.
Racing with some fantastic teams and team-mates have helped me to deliver perfect races the last three years at Le Mans. I’ve also been fortunate, in some ways, to be part of organisations that are so well-prepared, organised and focused – all the ingredients you need to win that type of race. Highcroft Racing has all of those attributes in abundance, and plenty more besides.
I’ve been part of the team since the beginning of their ALMS Acura programme in 2007, and I couldn’t be more proud to be going to Le Mans with them. It’s the biggest sportscar event in the world and the team is absolutely ready for it, so I’m really looking forward to sharing their journey.
It’s always been a dream of Duncan Dayton’s, Highcroft president, to compete at Le Mans. That’s the amazing thing - they’ve ticked every box on Duncan’s aggressive five-year plan: a factory deal, which they secured with Acura; winning a championship, which we did last year; and we were the most successful team in the Acura programme.
Now it’s time for Le Mans and to realise that dream. Part of the dream is to win and winning is something we’ve been doing well at Highcroft in the ALMS.
We head to Le Mans fresh from taking a four-point lead in the title fight after scoring consecutive wins at the last two rounds.
The last race win at Laguna Seca showed just what Highcroft is capable of. The guys were really under pressure leading up to the race as they had to fully test the new aero kit we will be running at Le Mans, and that’s not just a case of bolting on a few things. It’s a massive job to change all the components over and then change the car back to Laguna Seca configuration ready for racing.
The performance from every team member was superb. We achieved everything we needed to do and it was a very solid performance which has given the team a massive confidence boost leading up to Le Mans where I expect nothing less than a stunning effort from Highcroft Racing.
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