Welcome to Seventh & Broadway!

LAKEVILLE, Conn., July 4, 2005 - The dateline reads a small, rural town in the northwest corner of Connecticut but today in the American Le Mans (ALMS) race at Lime Rock Park it seemed more like Seventh & Broadway (aka Times Square) in New York City. Except for the multi-colors and exotic shapes, one would think that 22 taxis ran the New England Grand Prix on this tight, bumpy 1.54-mile track. TV and radio analysts all commented that it would take an incredible 125 cars at Le Mans to match the number of cars/track ratio here at Lime Rock. And like Times Square, accidents were the nature of the day. After scoring podium finishes at each of the first three races of the ALMS season, Pirelli-shod cars were involved in a few too many accidents on the short track today. The #35 Maserati Corse MC 12 of Andrea Bertolini and Fabio Babini had placed third at Road Atlanta for Maserati's first North American podium since racing legend Juan Manuel Fangio won the 12 Hours of Sebring in 1957. For the last ten minutes of the race, Maserati's in-car camera showed one of the day's best races as it came within 0.1 seconds of the third-place Saleen S7R at the checkered flag. But the most disappointing day belongs to the #50 Panoz Esperante GT-LM of Bill Auberlen and Robin Liddell, GT2 winners at Road Atlanta earlier this year. Leading the race for much of the day, Liddell collided hard with the #20 Dyson prototype as it surprisingly checked up in the chicane. The accident collected several other competitors and caused a lengthy delay for the Panoz, essentially ending its chances for a well-deserved podium. So, it's "Go West, Young Men" for the fifth round of the ALMS at Sonoma where all the Pirelli-shod teams are looking forward to continued progress and hopefully more podiums on Sunday, July 17th.