The official practise for the 2010 Merdeka Millennium Endurance Race came to an end a couple hours ago and it just went to show how close this years race is going to be. Almost all team's came through practise without any major breakdowns or other embarrassments, but there were some teams struggling.
Amongst the Honda's and Toyota's being towed back to the pits, the Gallardo of the Dilango Racing Team suffered a failure at the exit of turn 5 this evening, however the topflight team will be working through the night to ensure that the car is in shape for tomorrow's qualifying session. Other than that there just some minor issues but the most niggling one and the most talked about around the pits were the Pirelli tires this year.
Apparently they don't last very long and some drivers are having difficulty adjusting to it. We know of some teams that only manage to put in about 8-9 laps per set, not very ideal for endurance racing. The Pirelli booth was crowded today with team management and drivers yearning to find out how best to maximize the tires and judging from the crowd yesterday and today, it seems like the Pirelli crew has it handled.
Down to the teams and car, the crowd favorites and possibly the best of the newcomer teams at this years MMER is obviously the Audi works team with their R8. No issues, no drama, just plug in and play, or more like get in and race. The Audi R8 ran flawlessly and it definitely captured a lot of envious stares up and down the pits.
However, the defending champions, the Petronas Syntium team also put in quite a display of talent and raw ability and judging from theirs and other top teams performance, the Audi Team Joest is not going to be having it easy.
We look forward to tomorrow's qualifying session to see how all the teams stack up against each other, till then, here are the pictures from today's session.
