Nurburgring: Darren Turner race report

Many months of hard work were rewarded today when Darren Turner, and his team-mate Harold Primat, took second place in the penultimate round of the 2009 Le Mans Series at the Nurburgring in Germany. A stunning 1-2-3 for Aston Martin Racing locked out the entire LMP1 podium and saw the team move to the top of the team's championship table.

Darren qualified the 009 car in second place on the grid, just one-tenth of a second shy of the sister 007 car. At the start of the race the two Aston Martins got away well in formation with the third car, 008, a few places behind.

Double-stinting from the start, Darren stayed in touch with the race leader for over two hours before pitting to hand over to Primat.

"We double-stinted the tyres to start with," said Darren. "But we had a big drop-off so we switched to single-stinting which was more efficient. 007 and 009 were in contention for a 1-2 throughout the weekend. During the race sometimes they were in front and sometimes we were in front. It played into their hands in the end but it was a great result for the championship. Getting 008 home in third was then the icing on the cake."

It is 50 years since Aston Martin won the World Sportscar Championship so every effort is being made to make sure history repeats itself in 2009. As a key member of the Aston Martin Racing team, Darren is pushing as hard as anyone to win the team's championship so will be looking for another top result when the series arrives at Silverstone for the final round in just three weeks' time.

"Today's result was incredible for the team," he said. "No-one expected to see three Aston Martins on the podium so there is a real sense of achievement to be had from that. Harold (Primat) did a good job today showing a good, consistent pace. All we need to do now is more of the same at Silverstone!"

-credit: dt