The sad news? Tom Kristensen is retiring from the DTM series. The good news? He is totally focused ont he endurance sports car series Le Mans. Mr. Le Mans has decided that sports car racing is heading for a golden future. This according the Autosport.
“I believe that the future will belong to sportscars,” Kristensen told AUTOSPORT. “We’ve seen manufacturers come in, and everyone is looking at Le Mans at the moment.
“I think it’s a good time, because it gives manufacturers a chance to go in different directions with technology. It’s probably not a coincidence that [Ferrari boss] Luca di Montezemolo will be the starter at Le Mans this year as well.”
Perhaps planned or not, TK added fuel to the Ferrari threat to leave F1 by suggesting that it is no coincidence that Luca di will be waving the flag this year and the insinuation is that Ferrari may be looking at a serious entry beyond the GT class. Perhaps a Ferrari LMP1 would rev the hearts of many and Ferrari are no stranger to endurance racing.
The Le Mans series and ALMS have suffered this year due to the economy that prompted Audi and Peugeot to only race a couple events. Especially as they are the leading dogs in the LMP1 category. This has left the ALMS in a case of “my Acura can beat your Acura, dude!”. situation. To be honest, watching Acura’s fighting other Acura’s while the Lolas inhale their exhaust fumes is not the most exciting way to spend a Sunday. Oh sure, we can wax poetic about how it’s racing and how cool it is to see Gil de Ferrarn back on his game but in the end game; it is the big boys that light up the faces of the sports car world and having multiple teams in LMP1 is what fuels the fire.
So what is my impression of TK dedicating his career to Le Mans? “Well that’s private, Private. That’s between me and the Danes”.
