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General Motors Media Press Release

FOR RELEASE:  June 14, 2001
CONTACT(S):  Wally Reese  wareese@earthlink.net

Cadillac Continue To Improve Setup and Times; #63 Corvette Rebuilt To Perfection

LE MANS - DAMS Team Cadillac two Cadillac Northstar LMPs continued to improve the car setups during today’s first half session. Emmanuel Collard was one of only four drivers in the top fifteen to improve on his yesterday’s time.

At Corvette Racing, Pratt and Miller technicians worked all day to repair the #63 Corvette C5-R, which had left the track in the second half of yesterday’s qualifying. By the time the lights turned to green at 7.00 p.m., the car was as good as new, and Ron Fellows and partners were ready to complete the work they started yesterday.

“This session, we’ve been making a comparison of different shocks on car #5,” said David Spitzer, Chassis Engineer for Team Cadillac, “We’ve gone back to the original shocks with some setup improvements, which, combined with better conditions on the track, has made the car a little quicker.”

“On car #6 we’ve made some small changes in shock valving, which has improved the handling, though the time may not reflect that. We’re also doing a really comprehensive run through of tires for varying conditions, anticipating sunshine during the day, cooler temperatures at night, trying to find a good balance for both of those different conditions,” Spitzer continued. “Both cars are participating in the tire test with each doing a different part of the test. We still have not done a qualifying run per se; we’ve been working as quickly as we can on race setup. We’re very pleased with the potential and may get the chance to do the qualifying run before the end of the second session tonight.”

After Ron Fellows’ accident in yesterday’s second session, the mechanics had to wait until well past midnight before the #63 Corvette was brought back to the pits. “We brought the car back to the garage, evaluated the damage and didn’t see any major damage to the chassis,” said crew chief Bill DeLong. “It was mainly cosmetic stuff. We went home, got some sleep and came back at about nine this morning and basically put a new body on the car and replaced the suspension on one corner – that was it.”

QUALIFYING TIMES AT 9.00pm