Kiwi driver Brendon Hartley is hoping Porsche can transfer their impressive testing form into the opening round of the World Endurance Championship at Britain’s Silverstone racetrack this weekend.
The six-hour race opens an eight-event calendar that is highlighted by the Le Mans 24-hour race in June. Hartley is in his second season with the glamour team, driving alongside Australian Formula One ace Mark Webber and German Timo Bernhard. Porsche had a mixed introduction with the complicated hybrids last year but the team have worked hard and dominated the pre-season efforts.
“Last year we massively exceeded expectations,” Hartley told thecheckeredflag.co.uk.
“This year we’re continuing to push, and about 90 per cent of the car is new. The design is an evolution from last year, so we’ve kept the same concepts and improved them in all areas for this season.
“Because the concept is the same as last year driving the 2015 car is not too different to the 2014 one. However, we’ve made improvements in all areas so now we’re a lot quicker than we were this time last year. We have made great steps but so have our competitors, so we’re expecting a very close, hard fought race at Silverstone.”
The new 919 has done in excess of 30,000km of testing with 4000km coming during the official WEC pre-season “Prologue” at the Paul Ricard track in France. Porsche produced the quickest times in all five sessions, blitzing Toyota, who won five of the eight rounds last year. But there are suggestions that Audi have timed their run well as the green light approaches.
“It’s all constantly developing – both the concepts and the ideas, and I don’t think that will ever change. We’re all ready to go racing again: it always feels like the breaks are far too long so everyone at Porsche is really excited to be back and to take the fight to our competitors,” Hartley said.
Team-mate Bernhard backed that view up.
“We know it will be tough this season, but we are much more prepared in terms of experience. We know all the circuits, we know the strategies and different variables we have to face on track, and we obviously also know the competition more now,” he told motoring.com.au.
Webber, who is based in Britain and arguably knows Silverstone better than any driver in the class, said the weekend promised to be a test.
“Silverstone is demanding, with a huge amount of change of direction and fast corner combinations,” Webber said. “Silverstone stands for pure racing. It is such a classic track. It’s raw. It’s old-school.”
