Jan Lammers has decided not to compete in the Le Mans 24 Hours with Racing for Holland in 2008. Over the past seven years Racing for Holland often was the best performing privateer team at Le Mans. But Lammers finds the financial risks to big and is focusing in his role as team principal of Racing for Holland on competing with his team in A1GP World Cup of Motorsport. Lammers will also be active as racing driver next season; amongst others he has signed a contract with the Horag Racing team, with whom he will compete at the Sebring 12 Hours and the Le Mans Series with a Porsche RS Spyder prototype.
Jan Lammers; “I did not want to compete at Le Mans again with a big chance that we would lose money as a business because of this. Le Mans is held mid June and then you must be there and ready, also financially. We are not going to succeed in doing this for 2008, so we will have to skip Le Mans this time.”. By mistake the English motor sports magazine ‘Autosport’ reported last week that Racing for Holland would close completely. Lammers; “This only concerns our Le Mans activities. Also as a racing team the bottom line is first to earn more money than the cost you generate and thus make a profit. Second you have to be able to secure the revenues before you need the money. When you only get money halfway through February, but the payment deadline is already in January, you are continuously playing catch up. From that moment on you are mainly occupied with explaining to people why you cannot pay them. I did not want to put others and myself through this again. As far as our Le Mans project is concerned our costs were amongst the front runners, with our revenues in constant pursuit.”
Racing for Holland was making a name for itself since 2001 at Le Mans, where it was able to compete with the major factory teams for years as a privateer team. Racing for Holland also on the most races in the FIA Sportscar Championship, clinching the world title in 2002 and 2003.
Lammers is proud of the performance on track, but no longer accepts the financial risks. “Entering Le Mans demands a commitment of approximately 1.5 milion Euro. The moment you receive your first sponsorship payment is also the point of no return. Then you have the obligation towards your sponsors to go to Le Mans. From then on the only thing you can do is work hard and pray that you will generate sufficient revenue. Now I want to meet all my obligations from the past years first. I do not like hiding behind some holding company. I accept full responsibility. When we win we are on a podium, so if it goes wrong you must not hide. To me these kind of difficulties are an opportunity to strengthen the bond with people instead of terminating the relationship. We all have our problems, it is the way you deal with it that makes the difference. Through the years a lot of great people helped us out on important occasions and they have injected huge amounts of money, knowledge and motivation. I see it as my duty to reward this enthusiasm and trust in a fitting manner.”
Racing for Holland is concentrating on it’s other activities, like A1 Team Netherlands, running the BMW Touring cars in the Netherlands and a number of new projects.
“A1GP is going really well, the sponsor budget is complete and already for next year we are well underway,” says Lammers. “We will be very busy so it will be more difficult to determine what we are not going to do. It is not unthinkable that in the future Racing for Holland will return to Le Mans again, but only if the right ‘win-win’ conditions are there.”
As racing driver Jan Lammers will compete in the Sebring 12 Hours, Le Mans Series (a Championship of five 1000 km races) with the Porsche RS Spyder of the Horag team. He will also race in the German ADAC Cup with a Lamborghini Gallardo and is going to start in the Dutch BMW 130i Cup. Lammers also has received various offers for the Le Mans 24 Hours . He will take a decision on this soon.
