Prodrive 550 Maranello Wins in Austria
26.8.01

At the eighth round of the FIA GT Championship held at Austria's wonderful A1 Ring, the Prodrive-prepared Ferrari 550 of Rickard Rydell and Peter Kox emerged triumphant.

Furthermore, the N-GT class was won by another Ferrari - the 360 Modena of the JMB team Christian Pescatori and David Terrien, although this was a more improbable win with the car starting down in 26th place on the grid.

The Prodrive 550 led for many laps from its pole position but was gradually hauled in by the slightly quicker Lister-Storms. The Prodrive pit crew kept the Ferrari in contention, however, and once the leading Lister, driven by Coronel/Campbell-Walter, had retired the Ferrari was left to defend its lead in the last hour of the race. It eventually won by 48 seconds from two Chrysler-Vipers and the remaining Lister-Storm of Bailey/Springer.

Prodrive now intend to build a small series of six 550's for sale to private customers. The Factory are said to be watching the project with interest.

There was a second 550 entered, one of the Team Rafanelli cars in the hands of Naspetti/Duez but they never featured and had to retire with transmission failure.

The JMB 360 had a terrible qualifying session, with a down-on-power engine, but by virtue of being driven flat out by its two quick drivers it hauled itself up to second place in the class by the first round of pit stops. The class-leading Porsche of Riccitelli/Quester looked to have the class secure, but it then suffered a major loss of cooling fluid and had to retire. The 360 inherited the lead which it held all the way to the end.

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