Peugeot: Objective Le Mans

Despite today's difficult economic context, Peugeot has chosen to pursue its different motor sport activities in 2009. These range from its high profile endurance racing programme to the promotion of its products through its various single-make series. The current crisis has led Peugeot's management to seek synergies within Groupe PSA Peugeot Citroën with the appointment of Olivier Quesnel at the helm of Peugeot Sport.

Peugeot Sport suffered a huge disappointment in 2008 after coming so close to winning the Le Mans 24 Hours with the 908 HDi FAP which, even so, demonstrated its competitive potential with a score of four wins from five races in last year's Le Mans Series. The entire team is today fully focused on this year's programme, beginning with its efforts to iron out the shortcomings that handicapped its bid for victory last year at Le Mans. These areas include optimisation of the traction control system, preventing the radiators from getting choked up and improvements to the fitment of the wheels with a view facilitating their replacement by the mechanics. Meanwhile, it has been a case of adapting the 908 to the latest ACO regulations which target a significant curbing of performance.
"The engine settings have been completely revised to take onboard the new air restrictor dimensions and the lower turbo pressure which has resulted in a fall in power of approximately 10 per cent," explains Peugeot Sport's Technical Director Bruno Famin. "Significant work has gone into the 908's aerodynamics, too, in order to re-optimise the car's balance following the notable reduction in the width of rear wings which has been cut from two to 1.60 metres. We are also continuing with development work aimed at putting air-conditioning in the cockpit with a view to ensuring that the temperature inside the car stays within the regulatory threshold.