Heading into the Long Beach Grand Prix, the third stop on the 2009 American Le Mans Series (ALMS) schedule, Michelin is focused on providing the tires, technical support and insights needed to give its technical partner teams a winning advantage.
It is a challenge that Michelin relishes and has met in scoring 98 overall and 291 class wins in the first 101 ALMS races, and victories in the 24 Hours of Le Mans in each of the last 11 years. Eleven of the twenty ALMS cars entered will race with MICHELIN tires.
In addition to facing competition from multiple tire makers in the ALMS and on the European-based Le Mans Series, Michelin engineers and researchers must deal with the unique challenges presented by each car and team.
“We cannot compromise,” said Karl Koenigstein, Michelin ALMS technical team leader. “Our Michelin technical partner teams respect one another and the competition, but they are here to win and they chose Michelin because they expect Michelin to help them be successful.”
