Nissan's winning ELMS weekend‏ at 4 Hours of Estoril

Nissan-powered LM P2 teams take European Le Mans Series race and championship victoriesGT Academy winner Miguel Faisca makes brilliant LM P2 debut at ‘home’ in PortugalRussian racer and GT Academy winner Mark Shulzhitskiy shows his speed at Estoril

The 4 Hours of Estoril, the season finale of the 2014 European Le Mans Series, produced a race win for the Nissan-powered Sebastien Loeb Racing team and a popular championship victory for the Signatech Alpine team, which is also powered by the NISMO-tuned Nissan VK45DE V8 engine.

The European Le Mans Series is one of the most competitive championships for LM P2 teams, illustrated by the fact it has seen five different winners from five races this year.

Following in the footsteps of Lucas Ordonez, Jann Mardenborough, Wolfgang Reip and Mark Shulzhitskiy, Portuguese racer and winner of 2013 GT Academy Europe, Miguel Faisca, made his LM P2 debut at this event. He did this in the traditional style for the NISMO Athletes and was thrown straight in at the deep end.

Faisca, in his first ever race in an aero car, proved he has what it takes to succeed by turning in a double stint that any professional racing driver would have been proud of.

“That was amazing,” said Faisca. “I did over 50 laps and I must say it felt great. I was out during the middle part of the race when a lot of the top drivers were on track and I was able to hold position and put in some good lap times. I am very happy with my debut.”

Mark Shulzhitskiy, the 2012 GT Academy Russia winner, took the start of the four-hour race in the No.28 Greaves Motorsport entry. In an assured drive he burst through the field, moving up from seventh to fourth place overall on the opening lap. The Russian racer ran as high as third before coming unstuck while lapping GT cars but not before demonstrating that he is a future force to be reckoned with in Le Mans Prototype racing.

“It was a hard day for me,” said Shulzhitskiy. “The start and the opening part of the race was great but ultimately my mistake kept us off the podium. I overtook a Ferrari GT car on the inside and I got pushed wide onto the grass. When I put a little bit of power down the car began to slide and I had nowhere to go other than into the wall! This broke the suspension and some aerodynamic parts so even though we got back into the race; it was impossible to catch everyone up after that. It’s a real shame as I wanted to end the season with a top result.”

“It was a good day for Nissan today,” said Darren Cox, NISMO’s Global Head of Brand, Marketing & Sales. “The organisers of this event did a good job to encourage the fans to come and Nissan Portugal made sure that when they got here they had a great time. Miguel was a revelation today, putting in the sort of performance we would expect from one of the 2012 GT Academy graduates, not one of the class of 2013. Mark was unlucky and he should stop kicking himself as he showed everyone how fast he is in a P2 car.

“Congratulations to Philippe Sinault and his Signatech Alpine team,” he continued. “Philippe knows how to run a team and he has shown everyone again how to win a title. With a Nissan engine of course!”


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