e-tron helps McNish match racing legend

ALLAN McNish matched a feat only achieved by motor racing legend Sir Stirling Moss at Silverstone at the weekend.
The Scotsman, teaming up with Tom Kristensen and Loïc Duval won a thrilling Tourist Trophy race at the Northamptonshire circuit on Sunday (April 14).
The Scotsman was over 20 seconds behind in the closing stages of the six-hour race in the opening round of the FIA World Endurance Championship but fought back to steal the victory on the last-but-one lap.
For McNish this was a special moment. He won the Royal Automobile Club’s Segrave Trophy in 2008 and Sir Stirling Moss is the only other racing driver to have won both trophies.
This year’s Le Mans 24 Hour contenders, Audi and Toyota, had two cars each on the 31-car starting grid and battled for the lead places in the early laps, but even a mid-race rainstorm could not help Toyota and Audi took control, with their two cars battling for the victory. In the dying moments of the race the hard charging McNish swept past the André Lotterer/Benoit Tréluyer/Marcel Fässler Audi to win by just a few seconds.
McNish said afterwards: “We knew it would be a difficult race. The competition with Toyota was tough, plus there was a thrilling duel between both Audi cars. In the end, it became a battle between Benoît Tréluyer and me. After I spun, I went for maximum attack on new tyres. I managed to move to the front only on the penultimate lap. I’m happy about having scored the maximum number of points at the WEC opener for the second consecutive time.”
After a break of two decades, last year saw the formation of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC). The FIA WEC revives the historic thread of the World Championships which were, at their peak from the 1950s to the 1980s, every bit as popular, powerful and entertaining as Formula One. Today, the FIA WEC offers a multitude of opportunities to engineers, teams, manufacturers and drivers to compete in a high profile and prestigious calendar of events, based around the showcase of the sport worldwide — the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Presenting the trophy to the drivers, Ben Cussons, Chairman of the Royal Automobile Club Motoring Committee, said: “The first race in 1905 lasted over six hours and it is fitting that more than 100 years later we have gone full circle back to a six-hour endurance race in 2013. Allan McNish, Tom Kristensen and Loïc Duval are worthy winners of the Tourist Trophy”.
The Royal Automobile Club Tourist Trophy was first awarded in 1905. The winner of that race was John Napier driving an 18hp Arrol-Johnston in a race over four laps of a fearsome 52-mile open road loop around the Isle of Man. His average speed was 34mph. At Silverstone on Sunday, the winning Audi averaged 120mph.