Travel dramas

A significant number of members of the FIA WEC paddock had a rough trip to Shanghai earlier this week.

Eight members of the advance party from LMEM, including operations director Pascal Dimitri and event manager Cedric Vilatte, plus 13 members from the Signatech Alpine team, and eight from the compact Larbre Competition squad were on Air France’s flight to Shanghai from Paris on Saturday evening.

Unfortunately, their Boeing 777 developed a serious technical fault which meant the flight had to make an unscheduled emergency landing in Irkutsk, eastern Siberia!

The unlucky passengers were eventually lodged in a hotel but, without Russian visas or luggage (held by the authorities), it was a long three days before they were able to take another flight to continue their journey to China! They have now all safely arrived.

Meanwhile, at the Shanghai International Circuit, the paddock sprang into action to help the French teams as much as possible.

Team members from TDS Racing, Jackie Chan DC Racing and Gulf Racing joined members of the WEC logistics department and Signatech Alpine’s driver Pierre Thiriet to transfer the contents of the freight containers to their garages.

Others joined with them to put everything in the garages, thus saving Signatech Alpine and Larbre Competition valuable time needed for preparation of the cars.

De Sadeleer in the paddock

United Autosports’ ELMS LMP2 regular Hugo De Sadeleer is in the WEC paddock this weekend, and due to stay on in Shanghai for the Asian Le Mans Series opener the weekend after.

The Swiss told DSC that he is looking to get a drive sorted for the AsLMS race, after spending this weekend familiarising himself with the WEC paddock.

Driver changes

Dempsey Proton Team Principal Christian Ried confirmed to DSC today at Shanghai International Circuit that the father and son duo of Gianluca and Giorgi Roda will not return to the #88 Porsche 911 RSR this season, their deal with the team, that has yielded the ELMS Drivers Championship, is now complete.

Here in China, the team sees the return of Khaled Al Qubaisi for the third time this season (previously racing at Spa and Le Mans) with the three-man squad completed by full-season driver Matteo Cairoli and full season ELMS EbiMotors driver and Monza class polesetter Riccardo Pera.

Elsewhere, James Rossiter fills the third ByKolles seat alongside Tom Dillman and Oliver Webb once again, the Briton making his second start of the year after rejoining the team at Fuji.

Corvette back in the WEC paddock

It’s a weekend of firsts for Corvette Racing in Shanghai, which is back in the WEC for a six-hour race for the circuit time since 2014. Its immaculate GTE Pro C7.R is running the silver ‘Redline’ livery for the first time and manned by a team with very little experience of racing in China.

DSC understands that only a couple of the team’s personell have been here before, a couple of mechanics that assisted Larbre back when it raced Corvettes, and Oliver Gavin, who is yet to drive the circuit, but has been present at a race meeting before as a driver coach.

It will be interesting to see how the team fares…

DragonSpeed targeting strong run in China

DSC caught up with DragonSpeed’s Elton Julian who remains hopeful that the gap between the privateers and factory Toyotas will be reduced this weekend with the EoT change and additional Michelin tyre testing session.

However, the American team will not take part in the additional session, as it doesn’t want to put additional miles on the car early in the weekend.

“This track is known for being dirty, the weather isn’t great, so we don’t feel the need to go out in that session,” he said. “We’re more focused on the race itself, we want a good result here, we felt that fourth at Fuji was achievable had we not suffered issues.”

On the driver front, this weekend James Allen returns to the team for a second race, alongside Ben Hanley and Renger Van Der Zande. Henrik Hedman, who ran in the team’s BR1 at Spa, Le Mans and Silverstone, is due to rejoin the LMP1 effort in Sebring, a packed schedule towards the end of the calendar year cited as the reason for his absence.

After Sebring, he’s also due to race at Spa and Le Mans, finishing off the ‘Super Season’.