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THE opening lines in yet another chapter in the long history of motor racing were written last weekend after Audi came, saw and then conquered yet again in what is the most demanding and gruelling of all tests, the 24-Hours of Le Mans.
But this time their weapon was a new diesel-powered machine, and with it the German marque added the Le Mans scalp to that of the 12 Hours of Sebring they lifted in the R10 TDI's maiden outing in March, the first time an oil-burning race car had won amajor international motorsport event
In front of a record crowd of 235,000 spectators, German drivers Frank Bielaand Marco Werner, along with Italian Emanuele Pirro, clinched the sixth and arguably most important Le Mans win for Audi to date.
The identical pole-setting car of Scotland's Allan McNish, Italian Dindo Capello and Denmark'sTom Kristensen had to settle for a disappointing third place after a fuel injection problem put their car out of contention a little over three hours after thestart.
Their car had led in the early phase of the race before the injector problem delayed them in the pits for 21 minutes.
With virtually no hope of getting back into the fray, there was even more bad luck to follow, for after a coming together with a GT1 car, it was found the undertray had loosened, requiring another visit to the pit lane.
Then to really finish off their challenge, the left-hand turbocharger had to be replaced. All in all,...