Audi R8 News

I was away in Melbourne with the family visiting dad when the floods hit.  We got back last Saturday and ever since I"ve been busy cleaning up the mess, helping neighbours transport vehicles over washed-out gullies and bridges and getting petrol. The town has nearly run out what with all the generators running to keep power going.It's been a sad start to the year.  V8 Supercar drivers, race teams and staff have helped with various methods of raising money for the victims, many of which are avid V8 supporters. Team Vodafone is auctioning off some hot laps with me and Jamie Whincup.  It was also great to see a lot of other sporting codes contributing manpower to the clean-up and keeping the morale up.But it was devastating to hear that Peter Champion's museum of Brock race cars at Yeppoon is closing because of what the floods have done to the state's tourism industry.Peter's done a wonderful job of resurrecting Brocky's cars and historical memorabilia and displaying them in a single area. I spoke to him at Homebush at the last round and he was thinking about relocating. I certainly hope so.From a team perspective, the floods have had very little impact. We had no flood waters at the Banyo workshop and minimal disruption to staff.Our first outing is at Eastern Creek next weekend for the mandatory test day for all V8 teams.  It's a track I love and it's a real shame we don't have it on our race calendar any more.However, that makes it the perfect neutral place for al the teams to test and for the fans to have their first look at the new livery cars and driver line-ups.  Usually there's a bit of change with drivers moving between teams in the off-season, but this time there has been a team merry-go-round, mainly among race engineers.Happily, I still have Jeremy Moore as my race engineer and while some teams like DJR have been broken up, ours has stayed together. We've even expanded with Williams F1 engineer John Russell now heading up the team.I can understand race engineers changing teams with the drivers, because you develop an important relationship and bond.  If I was to move, I would want to take my engineer with me just like Valentino Rossi did with Jeremy Burgess.It's like a marriage. You develop an understanding of what you want from the car and how you translate that to your engineer and how he translates that into changes on the car.At the moment most of my planning is going into the Bathurst 12 Hour race next month.  Unfortunately, we don't get a chance to test  the Audi R8 race car before the event, so it will be a matter of going to Bathurst - which we know fairly well - and trying to get to know the car and its traits as quickly as possible.The car will have different aero to what I'm used to in a V8 Supercar and a totally different feel being mid-engined, so there is a lot to get my head around very quickly.  We're lucky to have co-drivers like Warren Luff and Mark Eddy who are also veterans of the Mt Panorama circuit, but it remains to be seen how quickly the German team come to terms with the mountain.Still, I reckon we're in with a good chance to challenge the favoured Porsche 911s for outright honours.  I didn't get to watch any of the recent Dakar Rally, but after competing in and winning my first Australasian Safari I was obviously very interested and kept up with progress on line.My Safari co-driver, Kees Weel, also kept me up to date with the rally because his company supplied the radiators to the VW Touraegs that finished 1-2-3.  I heard about Bruce Garland dropping out with broken vertebrae. That's a shame as he was running quite strongly and had a really good shot at the top 10.Hopefully one day I'll get to compete in the Dakar, but I was quite happy to have a break over Christmas.  It's been the first Christmas in a few years the whole Triple Eight team has been able to shut up shop, have a break and not build a race car.We're all heading back into HQ this week to go through the changes we've made and Jeromy tells me the car has more finesse.  Because we've had so few changes, the team is much better prepared than we were this time last year when we were scrambling to finish off the new Holdens.Having said that we hit the ground running with a 1-2 in the first race in the Mid East, so we really can't do much better than that this year.

CRAIG Lowndes leads a surprising Audi attack on the Bathurst 12-Hour race over easter with a pair of race-prepared R8 coupes. Rule changes for the endurance event at Mount Panorama have opened the event to sports cars and Audi has a pair of R8s coming from Europe - V8 Supercar racer Warren Luff will share with Lowndes - to take on the Porsche 911s that are expected to fight for victory.THE struggling Australian Rally Championship is headed for a revamp and improvement to its relevance under new chairman Scott Pedder. The retired driver intends to make the series more appealing to carmakers from 2011 and move it away from the reliance on the Subaru WRX and Mitsubishi Evo contenders that dominate entry lists.THE full-scale renewal of the V8 Supercars field will take place in 2013 when the category's Car of the Future will become compulsory. There was talked of an optional phase-in for the change in 2012 but V8 Supercars bosses now say the transitional year has been dumped in favour of a single switch at the start of 2013.CITROEN stalwart Dani Sordo, who was superstar Sebastian Loeb's sidekick for five years at Citroen, is moving to Mini for this year's World Rally Championship. Mini is only planning a limited program against Ford and Citroen before a full-scale season in 2011, but has signed Sordo the Spaniard as lead driver alongside Chris Meeke of the UK.FORMER champion Chad Reed made a tentative return to AMA Supercross racing in the USA last weekend riding a Honda for his own team for the first time. The Aussie was fifth at Anaheim Stadium in Los Angeles as Ryan Villopoto won on the Monster Kawasaki he used to ride.

The R8 GT is lighter, more powerful, faster at 320km/h and even quicker in a 0-100km/h sprint, which it destroys in just 3.6 seconds. Of course, it also promises to be even costlier than the $341,900 R8 V10 quattro that currently sits at the top of the Audi pricelist in Australia.Production of the R8 GT is limited to just 333 cars but it's an all-out effort in everything from the engine bay to the aero kit. There are lashings of carbonfibre, which helps to trim 100 kilograms from the bottom line as well as making the car more desirable.The V10 FSI engine is upgraded to 412kW, an improvement of 26kW with torque also up 10Nm to 540, and the cylinder heads are painted red - something done in the past by Ferrari."Yes, the R8 GT will be arriving on our shores, but the timing is still to be confirmed," says Roxane Persehais of Audi Australia. "With limited production of 333 vehicles, a small number will be heading our way. It's to early to comment on price estimates."The weight-loss work on the R8 GT is extreme, running to a thinner windscreen, polycarbonate in the rear hatch, a fixed rear wing, as well as thinner sheetmetal and extra cut-outs in the bonnet. The rear engine cover is made from carbonfibre-reinforced plastic, with a rear bumper and the sideblades of the same material.Deep inside the car, the brake system is one kilo lighter, 2.8 kilos of insulation is missing from the engine compartment and the battery is 9.4 kilos lighter. In the cabin there are lightweight bucket seats and lightweight carpet.But the weight-loss work has not cost the car its aircon, or MMI computer system, or its Bang & Olufsen sound system. Audi says extra tweaking in the wind tunnel means more downforce without a drag penalty, thanks to a carbon-fibre front splitter and 'flics' at the corners of the nose.Special 19-inch alloy wheels are unique to the R8 GT and there are, inevitably, GT badges on the front guards, and a numbered gearknob.Mechanically, the GT only comes with Audi's R-tronic manumatic six-speed gearbox, while carbon-ceramic brakes are standard and the ESP stability control can be deactivated for track use.For R8 GT owners who want to go all the way there is a special race package with a rollover bar, harness seat belts, a fire extinguisher and kill switch for the electrical system.

Was it "Big Bopper" - the '79 XB Falcon from Mad Max, or Steve McQueen's '68 Mustang GT in Bullitt. Or could it be the '64 Aston Martin DB5 driven by Bond in Goldfinger. How about the Mini Coopers of 1969 in the Italian Job? Or, does the '77 Pontiac Trans Am from Smokey and The Bandit top your list?Take our poll below to tell us what you think, or leave a comment if your top pick is not listed.But if the Oscars gave out awards to cars instead of stars, Audi would probably get the most nominations. During the past few years, Audis have featured in all the Transporter movies, Ronin, I Robot, Mission Impossible 2, About a Boy, Legally Blonde 2, Hitman, The Matrix 2, Iron Man and now its sequel.In the first Iron Man, Robert Downey Jr plays Tony Stark (a.k.a 'Iron Man'). His workshop houses a 1932 Ford Flathead roadster, a 1967 Shelby Cobra, a Saleen S7, a prototype Tesla Roadster and a 2008 Audi R8.Supporting roles were played by the S5 sports sedan driven by American secret service agents and a Q7 SUV which is literally held up by Iron Man, who saves the family inside from the enemy. For the Australian premiere, Downey Jr arrived in a silver R8. In Iron Man 2 he drives an Audi R8 Spyder and his secretary, Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow), drives an A8 TDI.Audi Australia corporate communications general manager Anna Burgdorf could not confirm whether any payment was made for the placement. However, she could confirm that the super-sport R8 V10 Spyder will arrive here towards the end of the year.The R8 Spyder 5.2 FSI quattro features a lightweight-cloth top that opens automatically in about 19 seconds. Its V10 engine produces 386kW of power and launches the open-top two-seater to 100km/h in 4.1 seconds on its way to a top speed of 313km/h.Product placement of cars is not new to the sliver screen. Most critics believe it started with Bond films, notably the Aston Martin DB5 in Goldfinger, in 1964. Aston returned in 1965 for Thunderball and was replaced by the DBS for 1969's On Her Majesty's Secret Service.Other companies then got into the act of pushing their vehicles on to the Bond screen with the highlights being the amphibious Lotus Esprit in The Spy Who Loved Me and the launch of the BMW Z3 Roadster in GoldenEye. Even a pre-production Aston Martin DBS scored a role in Casino Royale, and scored a Guinness record for "the most cannon rolls in a car at the same time" - seven - for its very brief appearance.Iron Man 2 begins screening in Australia on April 29.

The Toyota Prius is up against the Volkswagen Polo and the Mercedes-Benz E-Class in final voting for the world's most prestigious car prize. The three finalists are named today at the Geneva Motor Show in the second-last stage of WCOTY voting.The winner will be announced in New York on April 1.The WCOTY contest is decided by 59 jurors from 25 countries through two secret ballots. Apart from the main prize, there are awards for performance cars, green cars, and automotive design.The three final contenders for the 2010 World Performance Car award are the Audi R8 V10, Ferrari California and Porsche 911 GT3.The three finalists for the World Green Car award are the Honda Insight, Toyota Prius and the Volkswagen BlueMotion (Golf, Passat, Polo).

PAUL Morris got an inside look at the opposition when he turned some hot laps last week in a Falcon from Stone Brothers Racing. The Commodore team boss was asked if he wanted to try the car during an end-of-season ride day, as his 2009 driver Tim Slade also got his first run in the Falcon he will race in 2009.BROOKE Tatnell bounced back from a very ordinary 14th place for a sprintcar win at his home track in Sydney last weekend. Engine tuning work restored his Krikke Motorsport sprinter to full power for a local series event, following the previous weeks' World Series contest, and he was able to run at the front in a race where Garry Brazier ran off the track and Robbie Farr flipped to make things easier for the WSS pace-setter.YOUNGSTER Daniel Erickson is looking for a new way to graduate to the Star Mazda series in the USA after losing the backing from the Australian Motor Sport Foundation that helped him race Formula Ford in Britain this year. Erickson is bitterly disappointed about losing the AMSF support but is looking forward and not back for the next step in his career.ANDREW Thompson will join Fabian Coulthard in a two-car Bundaberg Red Racing operation in 2009 as part of the Walkinshaw Motorsport attack on next year's V8 Supercar championship. Thompson, one of the most promising youngsters of recent years, takes the place of David Reynolds, who could be moving back to Porsche racing with a European program for 2010.A super-quick Audi R8 GT3 will add extra variety to the Australian GT Championship in 2010. The 2008 series champion, Mark Eddy, has decided to switch from a Lamborghini Gallardo to the German racer and will have the first R8 GT3 in the country, while his Gallardo will be campaigned next year by Perth driver Ross Zampatti.MARK Webber celebrated the end of his 2009 season with two honours at the annual Autosport awards in London. He picked up the Innes Ireland award for courage and sportsmanship and the Bruce McLaren Trophy for the best-performing Commonwealth driver of the season. David Brabham and Daniel Ricciardo both received Autosport awards for their successes through '09.DRAG racing fans in Melbourne have not given up on plans for a new venue in the city, despite a series of setbacks in recent years. Anyone who wants to support the move should go to www.motorvatemelbourne.com

At the recent Frankfurt motor show, the German carmaker unveiled the drop-top Spyder, the electric e-Tron - and a chromed show car, just in case the stand needed any more bling. And now spy photographers Carparazzi have caught what is rumoured to be a version aimed at its lightweight Lamborghini stablemates. The stripped-out R8 snapped while testing at the Nurburgring is said to carry the same 5.2-litre V10 as the coupe, but with power boosted from the donor's 391kW. However there's no word of whether it will be given a toque lift as well. However with the lighter weight and even a little power, it promises blistering performance, with the 0-100km/h notch possibly being reached in the mid threes, while top speed could be around 340km/h. The pared-down pacer is tipped to be around 50kg lighter, and have only manual transmission delivering the outputs to the more dynamic rear-wheel drive. Exterior changes are said to be minimal, with likely some more spoiler kit and flaps on the front and sides, plus the huge wing shown in these images, which also reveal the rear diffuser has grown. Our contacts in Europe say the car will probably be unveiled at the Essen motor show next month and be on sale in the first quarter of 2010. For more spy shots of the Audi R8 Clubsport and more Carparazzi scoops, visit carsguide.com.au

Revealed this week at the Frankfurt Motor Show, the Audi R8 Spyder adds fresh air to the car that has become something of an icon for the brand .

The Frankfurt Motor Show literally roared to life this morning when a classic BMW 507 roadster ran laps of a custom-built oval track inside the German carmaker's $30 million stand.

The Lords of the Four Rings are expected to signal the start of an electric future with the unveiling of an electric R8 at next month's Frankfurt Motor Show. Confirmation of a high-end electric concept for the show, if not directly for an R8, came from Peter Schwarzenbauer, member of the board of management for Audi AG, during his visit to Sydney for the opening of the $50 million Audi Terminal company headquarters. "If you go back to the past all major new technology was introduced top down," Schwarzenbauer says. "I have a hard time understanding that the only discussion about electric cars is about small cars, understanding what the business case would be. "If you look around, a current battery package costs roughly 12-15,000 Euros. So if you take a smaller car that is also 12-15,000 Euros then you are effectively doubling the price of the car just by putting the battery in. I don't know how environmental you have to be to be convinced to pay double to drive electric." Schwarzenbauer says Audi believes that by adding the cost of the electric technology to a car that is at the top of the range makes it easier to assimilate the cost of the batteries without buyer resistance and effectively takes away the need for heavy government subsidies. "I think the electric car technology has to be introduced like all other technologies in the world, top down," he says. "I am not confirming it will be R8 but it will be at the top end and something very sporty that we are going to show at the upcoming Frankfurt show." Schwarzenbauer also quickly dismissed suggestions that any work Audi did on electric models would flow to others in the conglomerate such as VW, Porsche or Seat. "What we are showing in Frankfurt is for the Audi brand ... I am sure also that Volkswagen has something based around electric in Frankfurt but it is not my business to say what." One area that Audi does not see as the end game is hybrid technology, according to Schwarzenbauer. "Hybrid is a technology you have to get engaged in, not because you think it is a solution but because it is a step towards fully electric driving," he says. "If you are looking at only fuel consumption then you see that in Australia some of our competitors have one model offering as a hybrid. We have 21 models in the Australian market with a fuel consumption below 7L/100km." Schwarzenbauer says that at times the value and potential of more mainstream and traditional engine technology is lost in the rush to discover and write about things that are new and considered exciting. "I think sometimes that it is more interesting to write about the new technology, about hybrids, but the facts are different. The facts are that not one hybrid can really achieve what we can today with a modern TDi (turbo diesel injection) engine. "But of course in public perception that is old technology and people do not perceive how modern today's diesel engine is." He says that there is potential for further savings in economy and emissions in both diesel and petrol internal combustion engines. "That is why we have committed ourselves to reduce fuel consumption by another 20 per cent by 2012."