Tuesday, 10th June 2008

Nicolas Lapierre forced to stand down from Le Mans 24 Hours with test driver brought in to replace Frenchman for the big race.

Team ORECA-Matmut has announced a late change to its driver line-up for the Le Mans 24 Hours after Nicolas Lapierre was forced to give up his place in the team.

The former GP2 race winner was due to share the #6 Courage with countrymen Olivier Panis and Simon Pagenaud but has been sidelined by a virus that also forced him to miss last weeks test day at La Sarthe.

Having failed to fully recover, the team will now bring in test driver Marcel Fassler to fill the void as he prepares to make his return to the famous race.

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"I am very sad about what has happened to Nicolas," team boss Hugues de Chaunac said. "It really is unbelievable luck.

"For him not to do Le Mans because of this virus is like an athlete being told he will miss the Olympic Games to the last moment. However, we will recover from the virus soon and will be back in the car at the Nurburging,

"We had called Marcel Fassler in as a reserve driver and I am happy that we made that decision because he had an excellent test in the car at Magny-Cours a fortnight ago."

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