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Rant on championship vs LM:
I tend to value a championship over a single big race because a championship is a years worth or work over the course of most of a year, instead of a years worth or work put into one week.
I do believe that each racing series needs a grand event to symbolize it: NASCAR has the Daytona 500, Indy Car has the Indy 500, F1 has the Monaco GP, and so on. But I also believe that one race shouldn't dominate over an entire season. I do think that if Audi or Peugeot don't win LM, then the ILMC will be the major goal for whoever doesn't win LM.
Rant on Audi vs Peugeot:
Speaking of which, I guess that I'm a bit cynical over the fact that Audi and Peugeot both used Spa as a public test, and both have a bunch of little things to look at. Peugeot have to look at some driver disiplne issues and strategy issues, as well as fine tuning their cars, some of which was done at Spa.
In the case of Audi, they need to look at some issues that Peugeot had to deal with at Sebring--changing the bodywork and maybe making the tails or their cars a bit tougher, and getting the drivers more drilled in where certain buttons are on the steering wheel and dash to resolve the pit speed limiter and reserve tank issues that they had. And the big one is getting the R18's to work consistantly on changing track conditions.
I may be beating a dead horse, but it must now be stressed that if Audi don't want to merely equal Peugeot, they have to do like last year at Spa, and take what they've learned and apply it to their testing program before Le Mans. Mechanically, the R18 seems sound. It's now time to improve it's performance even further and fix a few issues. The gap is close to the 908s, it now time to try and bridge and exceed that gap if possible, because they can't simply rely on Peugeot mistakes to completely take them out of the game anymore.
I do think that the R18 has potential to right the ship, it's getting and using that potential now that must be the focus, and that's where fixing the little things will come in handy. It's like the Pontiac my brother owns. It didn't have one big problem with it, but a bunch of little ones. But once they were fixed it was like a new car. If Audi expects to beat Peugeot on a regular basis from here on out, they must do the same.
Personally, and I think that some of you may agree with me on this, but this is a pretty good justifcation for Audi to run in the ALMS again. They can use those races to keep the team and drivers sharp, and to test in public without losing out big time in a championship. Audi's best years at LM were when they raced regulary in the ALMS, after all.
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