Allan McNish: American Le Mans Series at Road America

Although the Scotsman scored a sixth class win of the season and now leads this year’s 12-race championship by 22-points, McNish missed out on a thoroughly deserved outright race win by just 1.783secs having led much of the turbulent, rain-affected race.

McNish reflected: “It’s disappointing to have started from pole-position, set a new race lap record and ultimately finish second by less than two seconds having led most of the race.

“I should be satisfied for winning the LM P1 class for the sixth time this season but as a racing driver, I’m never content to finish a race in second place overall. There was a very good possibility of us winning this race but it slipped away from us.”

Dumfries-born McNish, 37, started his diesel-engined Audi R10 TDI from pole-position – his first pole in North America this season and 10th ALMS career – after setting a qualifying lap record around the “roller-coaster” 14-corner, 4.048-mile track in Elkhart Lake near Milwaukee.

He led until pitting with a punctured left rear tyre after 46mins but was back in the lead on 69mins before slipping to second place when all cars stopped to change tyres because of heavy rain which led to a 65mins safety car period due to a flooded track.

McNish immediately snatched back the lead at the re-start with the rain now stopped and the track drying before handing over to co-driver Dindo Capello with 70mins to run, the Italian moving up from fourth and into the lead with one hour remaining.

The Italian made his final pit-stop for diesel and tyres with 33mins to run but charged back to within less than two seconds of the winning Porsche (Dumas/Bernhard) which also saved valuable time by not changing tyres at the last pit-stop.

The similar Audi R10 TDI or Emanuele Pirro/Marco Werner also started from the front row of the 27-car grid and finished third overall – second in class – the top-three taking the chequered flag just 2.4secs apart in the four hour race which saw three full course cautions lasting for over 90mins. Capello and Pirro diced furiously for the final 30mins, swapping places up until the final corner, and finishing just 0.796secs apart.

Audi has now won the LM P1 class in every race since October 2005 but the heavier Audi remains handicapped compared to the lighter LM P2 class cars by its regulation smaller fuel tank.

The next rounds are staged six days apart at Mosport, north of Toronto, in Canada, on 26 August followed by an inaugural ALMS race on Belle Isle in Detroit on 1 September – both 165-minute races.