Risi Sebring - Ferrari Owners' Club

Sebring 12 Hours: Successful Debut for the F430GT

23.3.06

The 12 hours of Sebring was a highly significant event for the Ferrari world as it saw the competition debut of the Prancing Horse's latest GT racer - the F430GT. This was in the more than capable hands of Texas-based Risi Competizione. The new tipo worked 'straight out of the box' and battled for the lead throughout, eventually coming home third in the GT2 class. We would like to thank the team for the material from which this report has been produced and the stunning photographs.

Background
Risi Competizione is one of the world’s top teams in sportscar and endurance racing, most recently having raced its own Ferrari 360GT in the ALMS GT2 class. The team also has had superb results running the Ferrari 333SP, winning its class at Le Mans, overall winner of the Petit Le Mans, and World Sports Car Championship, so there was no worthier team to give the new Ferrari F430GT its global competition debut, and that in the legendary 12 hours of Sebring, one of the world’s most important and prestigious long-distance sportscar races - in which Ferrari has a great record of success.

The Risi Competizione driver line-up for the 12 Hours of Sebring saw Ralf Kelleners being joined by Anthony Lazzaro and the latest GT hotshoe, young Brazilian Jaime Melo who was heavily involved in the development of the new tipo.

The F430GT
The brand-new Michelotto-produced Ferrari F430GT (s/n 2406) only arrived by airfreight from Italy at the beginning of March, and with just a couple of ‘workshop’ days before the team was scheduled to set off for Sebring, there was very little time to work on the car. “We only had time to carry out initial systems checks on the new car and make some preparation for the track testing programme,” commented Risi Competizione’s Chief Engineer Rick Mayer. “However after just a first glance this car appeared to be something special, a real racer in the Ferrari mould. We should really be able to take the fight to Porsche in GT2 this year.

Official testing began on 6th March and despite the fact that the tipo was brand new “out of the box” never having been raced, the team were highly impressed with the F430GT from the first and they faced the official practice sessions with great confidence and enthusiasm. These took place on Wednesday, 15th; with qualifying on Thursday 16th; the race starting on Saturday 18th March.

Qualifying
The F430GT posted the fastest GT2 lap in 2:02.807 (108.463 mph) during the opening morning session at Sebring, a time that would remain unmatched all day, and posting the third quickest time in the afternoon session. After qualifying had taken place and mandatory night practice was held that same evening, Friday saw no track action for the ALMS teams, allowing them to spend the day making final preparations and adjustments to the cars for the start of the race.

The Race
Race day dawned with thick fog rolling across the historic Sebring circuit, but this quickly lifted and the weather became bright and sunny, ideal racing conditions. There was a 20-minute track warm-up session for all the ALMS teams from 8:00am. The opening lap of the race saw Ralf Kelleners fourth in class, but by the end of the first hour he had moved up to second place (in GT2).

Jaime Melo then took over the car from Kelleners, rejoining on fresh tyres in 8th place in GT2. By lap 50, after 1 hour and 45 minutes of racing, the Brazilian youngster had snatched the overall class lead from Scott Maxwell’s Panoz, and was under team instructions to start opening up a cushion. Melo also set the fastest GT2 lap of the race during his stint, a 2:04.238.

As the dusk moved in and the 8 hour marked ticked by there was a truly enthralling battle raging for the GT2 lead with less than three seconds separating the top two cars on the track. Sebastien Bourdais in the Multimac Motorsports Panoz Esperante GTLM was just 2.826 seconds ahead of Anthony Lazzaro at the wheel of the Ferrari.

This had been the story of the race thus far: the F430GT and the surviving Panoz Esperante GTLM, continually swapping positions at the front of the GT2 pack as a truly frenetic pace had been set at the front. Several highly-touted car/driver combinations have been left trailing, quite simply unable to keep up with the race leaders’ pace.

As darkness rolled in, the temperatures started to drop under the cloudless skies, ideal conditions for the four hours night racing that loom up ahead of the waving of the chequered flag. “The car is going great. It’s very solid, no problems to report,” said Jaime Melo. “It’s very easy to drive, the finish is going to be a quite a battle,” he added.

As the chequered flag fell after 12 hours of intense competition, Anthony Lazzaro raced across the finish line at Sebring to bring the latest Ferrari GT racer home third in class on its racing debut, in this most grueling 12 hour duration marathon race.

The podium trio were eventually being separated by less than 50 seconds after 320 laps of close-fought racing. The Risi Competizione Ferrari F430GT was right in the hunt from the moment the new car was unloaded at Sebring earlier this month to kick off pre-race testing and battled for the lead throughout the race.

”The world saw the debut of the latest Ferrari sports racing car, this week” said team Managing Director Giuseppe Risi. “We’re delighted with the overall mechanical performance of the car. It’s been very satisfying debut for the F430GT.”

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