Despite losing their pole-winning streak in qualifying for the sixth round of the American Le Mans Series at Portland, Audi maintained their dominance in the race when they eased to a 1-2 finish.
Having only managed third and fifth on the grid when the Dyson Lola received a weight break ahead of qualifying, Audi proved to have the stronger package in a race defined by excessive heat, with Allan McNish and Dindo Capello coming out top, while team-mates Frank Biela and Emanuele Pirro followed them on the lead lap, albeit 42secs adrift.
The result also proved a race record, with the Scot and Italian duo getting 142 laps under their belt compared to Biela and Pirro’s 138 laps from the previous year.
"I had total knowledge that it's an Audi. It doesn't fall apart," McNish said of the difficult conditions. "With this type of racing, anything can happen. The important factor was to keep ourselves in the game."
Nonetheless, Capello admits that the car was not ideal in the early part of the race following a scramble down to the first corner that resulted in him being hit.
"The big challenge for me was to stay on the track," he said. "After I got hit on the first corner, the car got really difficult to drive. I had a big oversteer going right. To be honest, I was really happy when we got the full-course yellow. I was doing so much time and was afraid to make a huge mistake. The car was really unpredictable. It really was a nightmare for me to drive."
It is their fourth overall win this year and their fifth LMP1 victory, leaving them to extend their lead over their nearest competitors to 39 points.
"It was a great race again," Capello said. "We should have won in Salt Lake City. Now we have won here. We knew that the Dyson and Porsche were really fast. We showed our car is fast and reliable, but in the first stint something made it really hard to drive so we made some changes when Allan got in the car. So it's great to see the car come around."
