D-Brief: Riding the rollercoaster.

I feel like I have come off a rollercoaster after Le Mans, because we had very low emotions when the car was bad to drive, and with the fire, and high emotions when the car felt drivable again, as well as just being at the 24 Hours.

The team worked so hard through the week that I was worried they weren't going to make it through the race. They worked too hard in fact, and that summed up the whole Le Mans experience this year.

On the Wednesday, we were looking forward to trying all the improvements that we had made since the Pre Q weekend. We made a lot of changes and, on paper, it looked good. That was great - until we hit the track! The car was a pig to drive and we were just going round in circles and not getting anywhere. I put on a set of qualifying tyres and went for a time. It felt like I was on the edge, but we were going slowly.

We got that day wrong so, the next day, we tried going back to what we had at Pre Q and, all of a sudden, the car was behaving itself. I really dislike cars that don't do as there told!

Anyway, all the drivers were happier and we were now trying to make up for lost time. Thursday was a much better day and I qualified in the top ten. I was on another lap on Q tyres, which could have been better, but I flat-spotted the right front and pulled out of the lap for safety reasons. I did this at Pre Q and I had a big lesson on what not to do so, when I got back to the pits, Michelin thanked me for not finishing the lap.

It was a shame because I was six-tenths up at the second chicane and the car felt great. I was focused on a time of 3.32, which would have put me in the top six. Then we went onto a real low when the car caught fire.

It burnt the car badly and, late on Thursday night, the team said the chassis was finished and we weren't racing. I was gutted, but there was not much I could do about it, so I went back to the hotel thinking this was the shortest Le Mans I had done. Then, I got up in the morning and had a message on the 'phone to say we might be racing. On a high again.

I got to the track to find the car well on the way to being ready. What happened was that the team had gone back to the hotel feeling pretty bad, showered up and went to bed. Some of the guys went downstairs for a drink, however, and were talking about the situation when our carbon guy 'Scotty' Nash said he wasn't happy and wanted to go back to the track and take another look. As soon as he said that, the few that had stayed up jumped off their seats and said 'let's go'.

That's what I love about this team, they never give up. The race was on now to get the car ready.

Race day, and we were looking good with both cars looking great, the team did a mighty effort to get them ready. In the warm-up, the car was junk again and we were worried what the problem might be. Was it the repair job? Was it some part on the car which was wrong? We were on a down again.

Fortunately, we found a problem in the set-up and were relieved to find that it could be fixed. Jan [Magnussen] started the race and was at the tail of the lead group but, before his first stint was over, he was in the pits with a split oil line. It took half an hour to get the car back out on the track - and we were now in 40th place. Not a good start to a 24-hour race!

I got in and did a double stint and the car felt good and the times were quick. Bryan Herta jumped in after me and did his double but, when Jan jumped in, it didn't take long before he was back in the pits with an overheating problem. This problem never went away and we were out of the race around midnight. Another downer!

The other team car was running without a problem for about eleven hours, but could not continue to be trouble-free. It was in and out of the pits all night and eventually stopped in the morning.

It was a crap weekend really, and I hope we don't do that again.

Congratulations have to go to Audi for doing an amazing job - the R8 must be the best Le Mans car ever built. Top job, boys.

Speaking of jobs.....

DB