Lola were celebrating a 1-2 finish in the Le Mans Series round held at Imola last weekend. The Rebellion Racing team took maximum points in the third round of the five race championship. The result ensures that the Rebellion Lola-Toyota team are now joint leaders of the Championship with two rounds remaining at Silverstone and Estoril. Also a round of the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup, the brace of Lola-Toyota LMP1's placed 5th and 6th in the overall classification, once again being the first petrol powered cars to take the chequered flag.

Jean Christophe Boullion and Andrea Belicchi both had impressive stints at the wheel of the Lola which has shown consistent improvements in overall results since substantial aerodynamic upgrades were revealed at the Le Mans test in April.

"We have to be proud of the team and the work we have done," said #13 Lola driver, Jean Christophe Boullion. "From the beginning of the season, the cars are better and better. This result is very good for us."

Lola Managing Director, Robin Brundle added: "Our engineers in Huntingdon have been working tirelessly in all of Lola's on-site technical R&D capabilities honing new and innovative aerodynamic and mechanical designs for our sports prototype products to ensure we provide performance in a different class.

"As a company we are determined to prove that our customer sportscars are the fastest and most reliable cars on the grid," continued Brundle. "It is gratifying for each and every member of the Lola team to see that come to fruition with results like this."

The #12 Rebellion Lola-Toyota of Neel Jani and Nico Prost finished 2nd in LMS and 6th in ILMC to round off another impressive race for the LMP1 Lola entries, consolidating the speed and reliability that has made them the leading customer package so far this season.

As well as success in the Le Mans Series LMP1 division, the LMP2 Lola of Level 5 Motorsports scored their fourth podium position of the year in their open cockpit Lola B11/43 with an excellent 3rd place. The American team had a fine race and led in the closing stages only for two precautionary pit stops for a mechanical problem demote them to 3rd position.

Scott Tucker, who started the race in the HPD powered Lola was joined once again by Joao Barbosa and Christophe Bouchut on the podium to consolidate their 2nd place in the LMP2 ILMC points standings.

Pecom Racing scored more points at their home race with Luis Perez Companc, Matias Russo and Pierre Kaffer finishing in 4th place, just behind the similar Level 5 Lola entry. Companc suffered a spin early in the race but after recovering the Judd BMW powered Lola ran cleanly to register another worthy finish.

Team RLR were able to take positives after a tough weekend at Imola for the well drilled Lancastrian team. Despite an early set back with a steering problem, all three drivers fought back well with some encouraging lap times for the MG-Lola LMP2 car. Sadly, a late race technical problem ensured their 100% finishing record in the LMS came to an end but the tenacious team will be looking to fight back strongly at their home race at Silverstone in September.

Lola will be using the summer break to make some exciting announcements about future projects in endurance racing.

About Lola Group:

In its 53rd year of business, Lola is one of the longest established and most successful designers and constructors of racing cars in the world, keeping itself at the forefront of design and technology by investing in state of the art facilities including Computational Fluid Dynamics, Finite Element Analysis, a 50% scale wind tunnel and a 7 post aerodynamic suspension and chassis set up rig. The company is equipped and has the skills to carry out any major motorsport programmes for a manufacturer from F1 through every category of motorsport.

Having built more customer racing cars than any other constructor in the history of motorsport, Lola now also services the Aerospace, Marine, Automotive, Defence and Communications industries with a complete design and build capability in advanced carbon composites.

All pictures courtesy of David Lord and Peter May.