FORMER LMP3 champion Wayne Boyd is confident Nielsen Racing will give a better account of themselves at today’s Michelin Le Mans Cup sprint at Circuit Paul Ricard in the south of France.
At the opening round at Spain’s Circuit de Catalunya last month, Boyd and his bronze-graded co-driver Tony Wells took the chequered flag just inside the points-scoring places in eighth position.
Boyd had been targeting a strong finish on his debut with the British team despite no pre-season testing.
However, that lack of seat time, and a clash with a rival car during the race, put paid to that.
He is refusing to get too despondent and insists the lessons learnt has allowed for a fresh strategy to be drawn up in time for the two-hour contest which is set to begin at 4.50pm.
To determine who starts where, the LMP3 runners will be in qualifying action from before midday.
“I think the fact we completed zero pre-season testing – and pretty much all of the teams that finished ahead of us had done quite a bit – we can be quite pleased to finish where we did,” reflected Boyd, who remains the lap record holder in a LMP3 machine at Circuit Paul Ricard with a time of one minute 48.299 seconds.
“It is obviously not where we want to be, we want to be fighting for the wins, but for the opening race, I think we did pretty well in Barcelona.
“We obviously have stuff to work on, but we have a plan going into this weekend to improve. I think we should be in the window and be competitive.”
The Anglo-Danish lie-up of Tommy Foster and Jen Moller bagged a debut Michelin Le Mans Cup win for High Class Racing last time out from R-Ace GP Duqueine, with Interpol Europe Competition coming third.
Having had time to assess their own performance and identify where their rivals are excelling out on track, Boyd is of the view Nielsen Racing is arriving at Circuit Paul Ricard in better shape.
“We should be much faster in France and be able to get on with it more quickly. It has been a really positive start, and I am really enjoying being with Nielsen Racing and the atmosphere,” he added.
“Hopefully, we can get the kind of result we want we feel we are capable of this weekend. A win is what we want, but if we can be fighting at the front, it would be a good step forward for us.”