BRE compromised on aero
The aerodynamic revisions made to the BR Engineering BR1 after one of the cars run by SMP Racing took off in the closing stages of the Spa World Endurance Championship round last month have blunted its performance for Le Mans.
The front-wheelarch openings, one of the key weapons in stopping ‘blowovers’ since 2001, have been increased in size and more downforce added to the car.
This has created a shift in the centre of aerodynamic pressure towards the front of the LMP1 machine.
Dallara, which developed the BR1 for the Russian group, revealed that the changes inevitably came with a performance penalty. “We will have more downforce than planned,” said Luca Pignacca, head of the design office. “Unfortunately that means we will lose some performance here at Le Mans.”
SMP and its race team, ART Grand Prix, believe there will be benefits for the race, however. “We have lost performance, but gained consistency,” said ART technical director Gaetan Jego. “That’s important for the race because our target is to finish.”
The Italian constructor and BRE undertook the modifications in consultation with the FIA and the Automobile Club de l’ouest. The rulemakers also required the P1 runners to supply more information about aerodynamic loads on the cars in the wake of the accident in which SMP’S Matevos Isaakyan took off at Eau Rouge at Spa.
Teams had to open up more telemetry channels to race control during the test day to allow the loads to be monitored in real time, and were also required to supply a file of additional information every two hours through the test.
That explained why the #5 Ginettameca-chrome G60-LT-P1 didn’t set a time in the morning session. The Manor-run car wasn’t equipped with a full set of the necessary sensors, which meant it couldn’t run until the sister car had completed 15 laps. The #6 car was also late on track courtesy of what Ginetta and the team called a “paperwork problem”.
The Ginettas ended up just behind the fastest LMP2 cars. The best from the car, set by Oliver Rowland in the afternoon, was eight and a half seconds off the pace, but the British constructor pointed out that there is more to come from its largely untested contender. The car didn’t run in its definitive low-downforce configuration for Le Mans and had significantly more downforce than was optimal.
The Ginettas still completed more laps than the Dragonspeed customer BRE, which is powered by the same Gibson V8 as the Rebellion. The car had been built up around a new monocoque in the wake of Pietro Fittipaldi’s accident at Spa, and hadn’t turned a wheel before the test.