Team Bentley names first driver line-up for 2003

Detroit, 6th January 2003... Team Bentley is delighted to confirm that Tom Kristensen, Rinaldo 'Dindo' Capello and Guy Smith will team up to contest both the 2003 Sebring 12-hours and Le Mans 24-hours, driving the latest evolution of Bentley's successful Speed 8 Le Mans GT Prototype.

All three names will be familiar to Bentley fans, the first as part of the driver line up that has won the last three Le Mans, the second as the man who has taken pole position at Le Mans on the last two occasions, and the third as Bentley's existing test driver who drove for Bentley at Le Mans in 2001. It is believed that the multiple race winning experience of Tom and Rinaldo will fit perfectly with Guy's knowledge of both Team Bentley and, in particular, the Speed 8 in its latest form.

This line up will first be seen driving one of Bentley's new Speed 8s in an attempt to win the Sebring 12-hours in March on the team's debut in the event. They will then try to win Le Mans at only the team's third attempt in 73 years.

Tom Kristensen
Born: July 7, 1967
Nationality: Danish
Lives: Monte Carlo, Monaco

It is indisputable that Tom Kristensen is one of the greatest sportscar drivers of any generation. His record in the Le Mans 24-hours puts him among an elite handful who can truly be said to have mastered this most gruelling of races. Jacky Ickx and Bentley Motors consultant Derek Bell are the only people to have won Le Mans more often, but what sets Tom's race record apart from all others is the fact that his four victories have come from just six races. That is a starts to wins record that perhaps only Woolf Barnato - who drove a Bentley to victory in every one of the three Le Mans he contested - can better.

Tom started racing karts at the age of 10 in his native Denmark and took a hat trick of Danish karting championships from 1982-4. In 1985 he widened his scope to take the Scandinavian karting championship and won the title in both Denmark and Italy in 1986. Moving up to the global karting stage, he was second in the world championships in both 1987 and '89 before finally turning is attention to cars, winning the German F3 championship in 1991 and the Japanese equivalent in 1993.

Tom then took on both the Japanese Touring Car Championship and Japanese F3000, coming second in both disciplines in 1994 and '95 respectively, before coming a highly respectable 6th in International F3000 in 1996.

Tom won his first Le Mans 24-hrs in 1997 and made the move to F1 with a testing contract for 1998 before returning to sportscars for 1999. Since then he has not looked back, not only taking the hat-trick of Le Mans victories from 2000-2002, but also winning the Sebring 12-hrs in 1999 and 2000, and Petit Le Mans in 2002. Tom is also the reigning American Le Mans Series Champion.

With a ready wit that disguises a totally professional, dedicated approach, Tom's record qualifies him as probably the most sought-after driver in sportscar racing today and Team Bentley is delighted to have him behind the wheel of the Speed 8.

Rinaldo Capello
Born: June 17, 1964
Nationality: Italian
Lives: Canelli, Italy

Refer to Rinaldo Capello by his first name in the paddock of Le Mans and most people will wonder whom you are talking about - everyone from his friends to his legion of fans just calls him Dindo. He is also the man who proved that although starting your professional career as a child racing carts is a well proven way to the top of the sport, it is not the only one.

Indeed Dindo's racing career did not start until his was 18 years old, some years after his team-mates, but that did not stop him making his name first in Italian Formula Three and then in the Italian Super Touring Car championship. In the five seasons between 1994-98 he came fifth twice, third once, second once and, in 1996, was the outright winner.

His sportscar career really took off in 1999 and nowhere have his talents been more conspicuously displayed than in the Sebring 12-hours. In 1999 he came third, went one place higher up the podium in 2000 and has won outright for the last two years. In the last three years he has twice come second overall in the American Le Mans series and third once. He has also won 'Petit Le Mans' at Road Atlanta twice.

But the place that has best proven Dindo's speed is the one place yet to grant him outright victory. For the last two years it has been Dindo's qualifying laps that have brought his team pole position, in 2002 he was the only man to lap the track in under 3min 30sec. But while these efforts have been translated into podium finishes at the last three Le Mans, he has yet to stand on the top step - a situation he intends to rectify with Bentley.

Dindo Capello has been the quickest racer to drive at Le Mans for the last two years, but the fact that he has been there at the flag for all of the last four (he was 4th in 1999), proves he knows not only what it takes to go fast, but also how to keep machinery on the track and in good condition from start to finish.

Guy Smith
Born, September 12, 1974
Nationality: British
Lives: Hull, England

The faith that Guy Smith put in Team Bentley when he turned down a competitive drive for a rival team at the 2002 Le Mans to be the team's test driver has proven well founded. Guy's unquestioning dedication to the team, his superb work as a test and development driver, not to mention his formidable pace and mechanical sympathy, made him a natural choice as team-mate for the vastly experienced pairing of Tom Kristensen and Dindo Capello. It is also to be remembered that Guy was part of the driver line up for the Bentley EXP Speed 8 that actually led Le Mans in 2001 before its electronics fell foul of the appalling weather that visited the circuit that year.

And Guy has hardly been short of success in the interim despite not racing for Bentley, coming 2nd and 3rd respectively in the 2002 Daytona 24-hours and Sebring 12-hours, the only two races sufficiently gruelling to stand comparison with Le Mans.

Indeed Guy's Le Mans record started with winning the coveted Rookie of the Year award in 1999 when he qualified 20 places higher than the next quickest driver making their debut at Le Mans.

In a broader context, however, Guy is no rookie at all and he already has 15 seasons under his belt, thanks to starting in karts at the age of 12, winning four championships in five years, earning the McLaren/Autosport young Kartist of the Year title, graduating to Formula First in 1991 and finishing second in the championship in his debut year.

In 1992 he drove a Vauxhall Junior winning five races to finish the season second overall, a feat he repeated in British Formula Ford the following season, earning him a nomination for the coveted McLaren/Autosport Young Driver of the Year award.

Third place in the 1994 Formula Vauxhall championship led to the 1995 Formula RenaultSport championship, which he won outright, creating the step to Formula Three in 1996. In his first ever race in this new and testing discipline, he qualified on pole and won the race.

After a further season in F3, Guy went to the US to race in the PPG-Dayton Indy Lites championship, finishing third in the championship and claiming another 'Rookie of the Year' title.

More podiums and pole positions followed in Indy Lites during 1999 before a more permanent career in sportscars beckoned in 2001, gaining him valuable endurance racing experience at both Daytona and Sebring before his starring role at Le Mans was cut short in the race by mechanical failure.

Details of the new Bentley Speed 8 and confirmation of the other three Bentley Boys will be released in due course.