A new era of sports car racing kicks off in Florida on Saturday. The Sebring 12 Hours marks the return of what should be classified as a World Championship of Makes – even if we’re not allowed to officially call it that.

The tough enduro is much more than just the first round of the American Le Mans Series this year. It also counts for something that calls itself the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup, a seven-round global series for sports cars which includes the Le Mans 24 Hours itself. Last year’s three-race pilot series was a toe-in-the-water exercise. Now it’s for real – and even though a title with an acronym as meaningless as ILMC will mean little to the world outside the paddock, the manufacturers are taking it very seriously.

That’s because they know this is the start of something that should be very big. The series is the brainchild of Le Mans organiser the ACO. The target now is for the FIA to embrace the series and give it the World Championship title it so fully deserves.

Audi Sport boss Dr Wolfgang Ullrich summed up the feelings of everyone in sports car racing this week when he said during a press conference: “The ILMC means nothing outside this room. We need a World Championship and we need it quickly. Not in five years, but in two or three.”

There were nods of agreement from the rest of the panel beside him, which included team bosses representing the interests of Peugeot, BMW, Chevrolet and Ferrari.

It is believed that FIA president Jean Todt – who of course led Peugeot’s Group C campaign in the final days of the old World Sports Car Championship 20 years ago – is open to the idea of bestowing a proper title on the series. Let’s hope he moves on it soon.

At the front of the ILMC, we’re looking forward to another chapter of Audi versus Peugeot, as the two giants renew their intense rivalry on the bumpy concrete runways of the Sebring airfield circuit. Typically, they’re being coy over their chances.

Peugeot comes to this race with its all-new 908 LMP1. Yes, I know, it’s got the same name as the old one that won Le Mans in 2009, and at first glance it looks identical. But trust me, it is a new car. Just wish they’d given it the new name it deserves. A confusing decision.

The 908 conforms to the new 2011 regulations that have been designed to slow Le Mans prototypes, and make them safer. Diesel engine sizes have been slashed from 5.5 to 3.7 litres, while the most significant chassis change is the addition of the ungainly F1-style ‘shark fins’ on the engine cowlings. As featured in Motor Sport last year, these have been added as an attempt to stop the old problem of prototypes flipping during accidents. They look awful, but if it marks the end of cars taking flight, then so be it.

“This is a working session for us,” reckons Peugeot Sport boss Olivier Quesnel, who adds a quite remarkable statement regarding the team’s Sebring aspirations: “We don’t intend to win and I don’t think it will happen.” Well, that’s ambitious…

Of course, Le Mans is the focus for the Pride of France. But Anthony Davidson topped night practice on Thursday, following the team’s time-topping performances in testing earlier in the week. The new car has every chance of scoring a debut victory, whatever the boss might say.

At Audi, the new R18 coupé won’t arrive here until the day after the race, as the team prepares to continue its testing programme on Monday. Instead, the German giant is wheeling out its old R15 ‘spyder’ for one last fling. The car has been dubbed the R15 Plus Plus, to reflect the changes that have been forced upon it to allow the team to race it against new 2011 cars. Internally the team is calling it the R15 Plus Minus, which is more accurate. A power-sapping smaller air restrictor has suffocated the turbodiesel that won Le Mans against the odds last year. “It’s as flat as a fart,” was Allan McNish’s colourful description of the difference it has made, but that did not stop the two cars setting the fastest times in the opening pair of practice sessions.

Where the difference will really tell in the race is how much harder it will be for the prototypes to lap GT cars around the high-downforce circuit. With a field of 56 cars, avoiding trouble in traffic could well decide the outcome of this race between the two giants. There’s little in it for pace. As Dr Ullrich said, “performance is not everything for this race”.

The Sebring 12 Hours is always hard fought, and so it promises to be once again. And its significance, as the kick-off point of a new era, only increases the intensity between the two rival camps. Whatever they might say in press conferences.

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Will Power continued his mid-season domination of Indycar racing with Team Penske at Infineon Raceway (formerly Sears Point) in California last Sunday. Power took his eighth pole and led all the way to score his fifth win of the year. In the last five races the Australian has won three times and finished second twice, and with four rounds to go Power leads the IndyCar Series championship by 59 points from Dario Franchitti, with Scott Dixon another 36 points behind. Dixon and Franchitti finished second and third at Infineon.

Twelve months ago Power broke his back in a nasty accident during qualifying for this race. The accident brought an end to his year, but he’s bounced back in style this season, his first as a full-time driver for Penske. “It’s unreal,” he said. “What a perfect weekend. A year ago [I was] lying in hospital watching this race. I can’t thank Roger Penske and his team enough for giving me this fantastic opportunity. I’m just so happy.”

Infineon was the last in a run of five road and street circuits. The remaining four races, starting at the Chicagoland Speedway next Saturday night, are all on oval tracks and Power has yet to win a race on an oval. “I’m going for it,” grinned Will. “I want to win this thing. I’m not going to be sitting back. I’m not going to be stupid, but I want to win the championship.”

Veteran Penske crewman Clive Howell calls the shots on Power’s car and he is confident his driver is not only going to score his first oval victory this year, but prevail in the championship battle with defending champion Franchitti and 2008 title winner Dixon. “It’s going to be fun,” said Howell. “He’s going to shake that monkey. He’s going to be fine.”

Congratulations must also go to Brits Johnny Cocker and Paul Drayson on their excellent first American Le Mans Series win aboard Drayson’s Lola B09/80-Judd V10 at Elkhart Lake last Sunday. Cocker put the Lola-Judd on pole for the second time this year, then led the early laps and took over from Drayson for the final stint to win in style. After a late fuel stop Cocker went from fourth to first in the final laps, passing Chris Dyson’s Lola-Mazda, David Brabham’s Highcroft HPD ARX-01a and Klaus Graf’s Porsche RS Spyder.

It was a great performance by Cocker and an exciting finish with four different car/engine combinations fighting it out – a perfect advertisement for the ALMS. “I was flat out,” said Cocker. “That was the first time I went flat through the kink in the race. But it’s worth the risk. It’s unbelievable, just fantastic.”

The ALMS races again at Mosport next weekend, followed five weeks later by the season-closing Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta. The Audi and Peugeot teams will add spice to the Petit Le Mans, where the ALMS expects a record field of more than 50 cars.

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Allan McNish drove a superb race at Road Atlanta last Saturday to win the Petit Le Mans for Audi with team-mates Dindo Capello and Emanuele Pirro. The Scot made a grievous error on his out-lap on the way to the grid, losing control on cold tyres and crashing into the barriers. McNish was able to drive his battered car back to the pits and after the Audi mechanics made rapid repairs he started the race two laps down.

Driving at his ferocious best, McNish was able to perfectly use a series of full-course yellows to get back on the lead lap before attacking and passing the Nicolas Minassian/Stephane Sarrazin/Christian Klein Peugeot 908 in the closing stages. The lone Peugeot to run this year’s Petit Le Mans led most of the race but McNish was able run down the Peugeot and pull away to win by 4.5 seconds. Lucas Luhr/Marco Werner finished third in the second Audi R10 just three seconds behind the Peugeot. McNish’s performance stole the show at Road Atlanta but the big news of the weekend was the Penske/Porsche team’s sweep of the LMP2 category.

Penske’s Porsche Spyders finished one-two-three in class and fourth, fifth and sixth overall so that Roman Dumais/Timo Bernhard wrapped up the P2 drivers’ championship after the Acura teams stumbled badly. Dumais/Bernhard finished fifth overall, eighteen seconds behind the class-winning Porsche driven by Ryan Briscoe/Helio Castroneves. The latter was delighted to be aboard the car for the final, winning stint after his appearance (in handcuffs and leg chains, no less) the day before at a federal court in Miami where he was formally indicted for tax evasion.

Three of the four Acura P2 cars entered in the race were eliminated in accidents. Incredibly, point leader Scott Sharp crashed his Highcroft Acura in practice, then crashed again early in the race preventing team-mates David Brabham and Dario Franchitti from running a single lap. Sharp’s miserable weekend essentially handed the P2 Drivers’ Championship to Porsche men Dumais and Bernhard.

The Andretti-Green and Fernandez Racing Acuras also crashed out of the race. Franck Montagny was battling for the P2 lead in the race’s final hour when his Andretti-Green Acura was eliminated in a nasty, multi-car accident triggered by Georges Forgeois spinning his Lola. Luis Diaz was aboard Adrian Fernadez’s Acura earlier in the race when he was hit by a GT car, terminally damaging his car’s suspension. The only Acura to finish was Gil de Ferran’s car driven by de Ferran/Simon Pagenaud/Scott Dixon, which came home eighth overall and fifth in class behind one of the Dyson Porsches driven by Marino Franchitti/Andy Lally/Butch Leitzinger.

The eleventh and final ALMS race of the year takes place in two weeks at Laguna Seca where the Acura teams will try to salvage the LMP2 manufacturers championship. After Penske’s sweep of the Petit Le Mans P2 category, Porsche leads Acura by eight points (192 to 184). Of course, Audi and Luhr/Werner have already wrapped-up the P1 manufacturers and drivers titles.

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Ah Sebring! A famously old WWII airfield in the middle of central Florida is the home of America’s most enduring road race. First run in 1952, the Sebring 12 Hours is one of the roughest, toughest races of the modern age. There’s nothing contemporary about the track or its facilities and its mid-March date has long made the twelve hours one of Florida’s many big ‘Spring Break’ parties. The crowd is there to have a good time in the growing late winter heat with the sights and sounds of a classic motor race as a convenient backdrop.

This year’s 56th running of the Sebring 12 hours was billed as a Le Mans preview centered on the duelling turbo diesels from Audi and Peugeot. The race was supposed to be all about a titanic struggle between the two factory teams from Germany and France, but both Audi R10s and the lone Peugeot 908 ran into unexpected troubles as the Penske-Porsche team came through to score Penske Racing’s first win in the endurance classic and the first outright Sebring win for Porsche in twenty years. It also meant Penske becomes the first team owner to win both the Daytona 500 and Sebring 12 hours in the same year and the first team owner able to boast of wins at Indianapolis, Daytona and Sebring. And it brought an end to Audi’s eight-year Sebring winning streak.

Before the race, Audi ace Alan McNish reckoned the lighter LMP2 Penske Porsche Spyders were serious dark horses to win the 12 hours. “We saw Penske and Porsche step up last year and raise the bar,” McNish remarked. “Porshe improved their downforce from last year and between that and their fuel advantage, they will be very hard to beat.

“The Porsches are good in every situation,” McNish added. “They are a little slower than us in qualifying but their race pace is very similar to ours. Also, the LMP2 cars’ fuel capacity mean they can run longer than us on a tank of fuel which can add up to three pitstops less over the course of a twelve-hour race. So that’s a lot of advantage in their pocket.”

As Audi focuses its factory racing efforts with its R10 on Europe this year, it will be interesting to see if the Penske Porsche RS Spyders will continue their winning ways in the American Le Mans Series. After winning eight races last year and Sebring for the first time in twenty years, has Porsche replaced Audi as the new standard-setter for the ALMS?

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