Tom drove the Arena Motorsport’s Zytek LMP1 car at Paul Ricard last week in preparation for the team’s Le Mans programme The three day test in the south of France was primarily a shakedown of Arena’s new car – the Zytek 07s LMP1. Tom was joined in the driving duties by Stefan Johansson and Hayanari Shimoda and all three expressed positive initial impressions of the car;

“It was really good to get behind the wheel of a sportscar again” Tom said, “Arena’s car is a completely new Zytek and quite different from the one I raced in 2005. It has more power, more downforce and felt different to drive. It was only a shakedown test really, but I got enough laps in the car to see that this has a lot of potential.”

“I enjoyed working with Hayanari again and it was good to meet and work with Stefan. He’s got so much experience and the three of us will be a strong team.”

The test saw a number of partnerships renewed, Tom with Arena who ran him for three years in the Honda BTCC car as well as him and Hayanari in the Zytek back in 2005 when the pair won races in both the European and American Le Mans series.

Stefan has a long association with Arena team principal Mike Earle who ran the Swedish driver in a Gulf entered Audi R8 at Le Mans in 2001 as well as in his Onyx Formula 1 team back in 1989.

Tom, Stefan and Hayanari are Arena’s intended driver line up for the Le Mans 24 hour race in June, but Tom will have to miss the team’s first race with the Zytek this weekend at Valencia due to his contractual obligations with Vauxhall in the BTCC. Rather than southern Spain, Tom will be competing at sunny Thruxton in the VXRacing Vectra in the latest rounds of the BTCC.