The G-Drive by Signatech-Nissan team will start tomorrow’s 6 Hours of Bahrain from 13^th on the grid overall, and seventh in LMP2 class, after Roman Rusinov qualified the #26 car this afternoon. 

The team has worked hard in the three practice sessions so far at the Bahrain International Circuit as it seeks to add another strong LMP2 result to its 2012 tally so far.

All three drivers, Rusinov, Ragues and Nelson Panciatici have had time in the cockpit of the Nissan-powered #26 Oreca 03 car around the 6.299km Bahrain endurance configuration, working on car set-up around the desert track, tyre evaluation with Dunlop and acquainting themselves with a circuit that is new to endurance racing.

On used tyres in Thursday’s free practice, the team was close to the front-running pace in LMP2. The team will now hope to make progress during the six hour race tomorrow, making the most of their competitive package and technical reliability to advance through the field towards the podium positions. The track has, however, so far proven to be tough on both brakes and tyres with tyre degradation proving to be a key element for Saturday’s race.

Pierre Ragues said: “Roman was on qualifying duties for us this weekend so there wasn’t much for me to do this afternoon. 7^th in class gives us a reasonable position from which we can build on in tomorrow’s six hour race because we have focussed a lot on race pace in free practice. We have spent a lot of time on the set-up of the Oreca 03 chassis and working with Dunlop tyres to find the most competitive package possible for this race. It is a new track for us so we have had to acclimatise to the conditions. It has been interesting and I am sure there is more to come from us tomorrow. We have had to look closely at brake and tyre wear around the track with both elements looking to be influential factors for the race. As always, we’ll be homing in on an LMP2 podium but it’s going to be a challenging race.”