1000 KM OF ALGARVE - Le Mans Series 2010 Round 3  REBELLION RACING ONCE AGAIN ON THE PODIUM   Neel Jani and Nicolas Prost finished second in the Le Mans Series 1000 km of Algarve.  This is the second podium in three Le Mans Series races in 2010 for REBELLION Racing after  their  third  place  finish  at  the  8  Hours  of  Le  Castellet.               Jean- Christophe  Boullion  and  Andrea  Belicchi  finished  fourth  in  the  LMP1 category  with  the  #13  Lola-Rebellion,  thus  scoring  important  points  to keep the Championship hopes alive.   An additional challenge made the early stages of the race tough for the two Lola-Rebellion cars since they were relegated to the last row of the grid; the #12 car was penalised for having excessive wear to the flat floor during  the  qualifying  session  and  the  #13  for  having  to  change  two damaged tyres after qualifying. It was a shame because the team had had a good qualifying session, Neel Jani with #12 had set the second fastest time with a 1'30''937, only three-tenths off the Peugeot 908 HDi- Oreca,  Andrea  Belicchi  was  fourth  (1'31''831)  after  an  engine  change overnight for the #13 car.   As  soon  as  the  race  started,  both  Lola-Rebellions  started  to  recover places.  With fantastic drives from Andrea Belicchi and Neel Jani, it took only six laps to have both Lola-Rebellions in the top 6.   After two hours and twenty minutes of racing, Nico Prost with #12 and Jean-Christophe  Boullion  in  #13  were  respectively,  strongly  placed  in second and third, with their sights set on a great result.     However, at mid-race the bumpy rollercoaster Algarve track forced the #13 Lola-Rebellion to have to stop in the pits to identify and repair a leak in the oil system.  After the repairs, Andrea Belicchi took over behind the wheel and started to recover again from the back of the classification.   With  Neel  Jani  and  Nicolas  Prost  strongly  positioned  in  second  place with the Lola-Rebellion #12, but already three laps behind the leading diesel  powered  car,  they  started  to  manage  their  lead  over  the  third placed #008 Aston Martin car.  The #12 car went on to a richly deserved second placed finish.   After  a  challenging  weekend,  the  #13  car  finished  in  4th  place  in  the LMP1 class, thus scoring highly valued points in the championship.  With 40  points,  the  Lola-Rebellion  #13  is  now  only  four  points  behind  the Championship leading factory Audi #7 and still one point in front of the third placed Peugeot-Oreca #4.   Jean-Christophe Boullion and Andrea Belicchi are still third in the LMS drivers classification.   With their second place finish Nico Prost and Neel Jani are sixth in the drivers championship.    Nicolas Prost: "Honestly, it's the hardest race of my life. The heat and bumps of the track made my stints very stressful, even though the race conditions were the same for everyone! We had a good race and we can be  satisfied  with  our  work.  After  two  second  places  in  the  Le  Mans Series, I now look forward to my first victory!"   Neel Jani: "My first stint was not easy. Starting from the last row on the grid, we had to go through so much traffic!  I also had a problem with my drinking system which meant I had no drink. Even though we recovered to second place after two stints, we saw that we could not catch the race leading Peugeot.  We tried to maintain our position taking care of the car and this strategyhas paid off." Â
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