But it still outshone the field in the recent American Le Mans series race at Road America.

The ALMS (governing body) have given the car a weight penalty of 65kg, which by Audi’s calculations will make the car around 1.3 seconds a lap slower.

This however did not stop the two R10’s of Frank Biela and Emanuele Pirro and the other car of Allan McNish and Dindo Capello from coming in 1-2 in the race.

It does seem however that the Audi works R10’s may not appear in the American series next year, the reason being that the ALMS have rushed through the rule changes (the petrol cars will be allowed a 5ltr larger fuel tank next race as well as the Audi’s carrying ballast) in the middle of the race season.

This put’s Audi at a disadvantage, they have proved that a Diesel race engine does work, not only is it more frugal, but it’s more powerful as well.

Audi will probably still run in the European events where they have not been penalised yet, and I don’t see why they should be, after all they obviously spent a great deal of money developing the Derv technology. There is also nothing stopping the other teams from developing and running a Diesel engine that would have similar benefits for them.