PRESS RELEASE

SUCCESS AT MERDEKA MILLENNIUM 12 HR IN MALAYSIA

Team Mirage Australia has again finished another International Endurance Event.

Led by Team Owner/Lead Driver Mal Rose, the 2 car Mitsubishi Cup cars finished the gruelling event.

The race was held at the Sepang International Raceway, Malaysia on Aug 25-27 with 77 cars in 4 classes.

Starting at midnight Saturday August 26th was a first in this endurance racing and the battle lines were set. Team Mirage Car 90 was driven by Mal Rose, Peter Leemhuis & Tony Alford, and Car 94 was driven by Richard Gartner, Shane Brangwin & Layton Crambrook. Qualifying was based on a average of all 3 drivers and Car 94 started 35th with Car 90 starting 45th.

The two fastest qualifying drivers (Car 90 Mal Rose 2:40.312 & Car 94 Layton Crambrook 2:43.311) started the race as per the rules and proceeded to carve their way through the field. Both cars were set for a class lead in only the first hour when drama struck with Layton Crambrook experiencing a tyre failure before the scheduled driver change (75 Minutes).

Just 1 hour later the same fate would strike Car 90 with Peter Leemhuis behind the wheel. Both cars blowing front tyres causing them to drop back several places.

The drama had only started when at 3.30 am (in the dark) a tropical thunderstorm struck causing the crew to swap from the Control Slick (Silverstone) to a wet weather tyre.

This was a turning point for the event as both Mal & Layton behind the wheel began lapping the field, including the leading Lotus & Porsches. The pocket rockets were in a class of their own and together with heated windscreens were able to outpace most of the field. The maximum driving time was 75 minutes per driver (and max 5 hours total per Driver) so each team driver experienced the incredible pace of the Mitsubishi Mirage Cup cars in the wet condition. The rain lasted till 6.00am and by daybreak the track dried enough to send the cars back on slick tyres. Our team was the first to go back to slicks and by the 6th hour we were back within 2 laps of the class leading Hondas.

However the drama was started again with a spectacular tyre failure on Car 94 with Richard Gartner driving causing the front guard/bumper to be torn off. This also caused a electrical problem as the wiring caused the lights to blow a fuse and the car would be black flagged to be repaired. Car 90 with Mal Rose & Peter Leemhuis driving had more tyre failures causing the 16 max allocation to run to the limit!

The heat of the day and the pace was too much for the Silverstone Slicks and the team suffered 5 blown tyres.

Note that the event is for Class B & C on a controlled tyre and a controlled fuel rig and fuel amount.

The cars usually race on Toyo radials and in 6 years and 25,000 km have never had a failure. The team also raced the full 12 hours with only one set of DBA disc rotors (5000 Series) and 1 set of brake pads.

By race end the team raced home for a 18th & 19th outright placing with 5th & 6th in Class C (1600cc). Car 90 & 94 completed 229 laps and were separated by 1:20.377.

Fastest lap in Qualifying was 2:40.312 set by Mal Rose.

Fastest lap in Race was 2:42.284 set by Layton Crambrook.

Note: BOTH cars were only 2 laps off a podium finish, and this result continues Team Mirage Australia's 100% finishing record.

Team Mirage is proudly supported by DBA, Disc Brakes, Castrol Oils, 5 Star Driveshaft Reconditioning, Rehydr8 and XenonOz.