MULTIMATIC ADDS GADE TO ENGINEERING TEAM
Multiple Le Mans-winning race engineer Leena Gade heads a significant off-season recruitment drive from Mazda Team Joest and Multimatic, ahead of the partnership’s second season contesting the Daytona Prototype international class in the IMSA Sportscar Championship.
Following the closure of Audi’s successful LMP1 programme in 2016, which was run by Team Joest, Gade had stints with Bentley in sportscars and Schmidt Peterson Motorsports in Indycar, but departed the latter mid-season after James Hinchcliffe failed to qualify for the 2018 Indianapolis 500.
Having joined Multimatic as a vehicle dynamics manager and race engineer in October, Gade will engineer the RT24-P driven by Harry Tincknell and Tristan Nunez. Timo Bernhard and Rene Rast will complete the line-up for Daytona.
In addition to Gade, Joest has appointed veteran team manager Chris Mower as team coordinator and former Audi engineer Brad Kettler as a consultant. Long-time Joest man Jan Lange has replaced Ralf Juttner as the CEO of Mazda Team Joest.