BMW attacks rivals over changes

First posted on 17th February 2012 at Legends Racing League

BMW will defend their titles with the same M3 GT2 model for Season 3 but has had to negate it's performance

BMW Motorsport Director Jens Marquardt has accused his team's ALMS rivals of seeking to significantly decrease their car's performance.

Mr Marquardt was speaking at Mazda Laguna Seca where the outfit were shaking down their Season 3 defender, the BMW M3 GT2. Protests from the ALMS paddock last season has led to the governing body to intervene in the off-season and restrict some of the M3 GT2's performance for equalization purposes.

"The off-season is the opportunity for all teams to put on and try out major updates on their cars, but instead we have now been paralyzed in our development programme," said Mr Marquardt. "Because we have done such a good job it seems that others could not keep up. We are of course upset by the governing body's intervention but it is also testament to our strong work ethic back at the factory who delivered such a fantastic car last season. I have no doubt that, despite being cut off in some areas of the car, we still have a race winner ready to fight for the Championship."

BMW have also been hit hard by more of the new Season 3 regulations, with the series now only allowing teams to run two cars per race in a bid to save costs. The team ran as many as four cars last season, including double Champion Kptk92 who had a sensational campaign last season, winning the Championship by 45 points.

When asked about the new car and how it had been changed by the regulations, Kptk92 replied: "The team have done a super job recovering some of the time that we have lost. We've lost a bit of downforce and our straight line speed is a little bit weaker so the car is definitely not going to be as competitive as it was last season plus the other teams appear to have come up with some really top cars in the off-season, but I'm pleased with the progress we've made so far."

BMW have retained the defending Champion for the upcoming season, who will be joined by iWiP3OuTzz x - who had a relatively quiet rookie season, taking just one podium at the blue riband event at Le Mans for the Ford team.