McNish hits back to keep Le Mans Series bid on track

Published on Monday 21 May 2007 12:01

SCOT Allan McNish extended his lead in the American Le Mans Series after he stormed from the back of the grid to finish second in the latest round in Salt Lake City, Utah.

The 37-year-old from Dumfries was again the leading LMP1 runner in his diesel-powered Audi R10TDI behind the winning, and significantly lighter, LMP2 Porsche of Aussie Ryan Briscoe.

Having qualified eighth, McNish and his Italian co-driver Dindo Capello were relegated to the back of the grid after being forced to replace their tyres which were damaged at the end of qualifying.

Capello was fourth after eight of the 165 minutes of the race, second after 22 mins following a full course yellow and in to the lead on 58 mins.

McNish took over the leading Audi on 68mins resuming in fifth and was back in to the lead on 93mins but slipped to second after making his final pit-stop with 35mins to run.

The Scot finally finished just 9.932secs behind the Porsche of Briscoe.

"I don't think it could have gone any faster in the race," said McNish. "Ultimately our performance just wasn't quite good enough in terms of an outright win but realistically second place was much, much better than we ever expected."

There was mixed fortune for the other two Scots in the race. Bathgate's Marino Franchitti was forced out after just 20 laps when his Honda-powered Andretti Green Acura developed problems while Edinburgh's Robin Liddell recorded his third ALMS GT2 podium of the season in his Tafel Racing Porsche 997.