Last update: October 16, 2025
The Audi R8 was the dominant sport car in the beginning of this century. The Joest cars – the official works entry – were the most successful and best known. An overview of these can be found here. A limited number of customer teams that were often supported by local Audi distributors, received a one year old Audi R8. When Joest stopped racing the R8 at Le Mans and the American Le Mans Series, these teams took over. Below we give an overview per team.
Stefan Johansson – Gulf
2001 Le Mans 24h, Johansson Audi R8. Joest Audi entered two cars for the 2001 Le Mans race and offered two year one year old cars to selected teams. One of them is Stefan Johansson‘s in the famous Gulf Livery, who raced the entire European Le Mans Series with it with technical support from Arena Racing. At Le Mans, the car retired after electric problems.
#4 Stefan Johansson (S) / Tom Coronel (NL) / Patrick Lemarie (F) – DNF
Arena Audi R8 (2000) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 600 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #403
- IXO Modern Le Mans & GT Cars LMM004 (diecast)
2001 Petit Le Mans, Johansson Audi R8. The Johansson / Arena Motorsport Audi also competed in the Petit Le Mans. They finished in 2nd place, 3 laps down on the Joest Audi.
#18 Stefan Johansson (S) / Patrick Lemarie (F) – 2nd
Arena Audi R8 (2000) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 600 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #403
- MINICHAMPS MC400 010918 limited to 1440 pcs (diecast)
Champion Racing – Audi Sport North America
2001 Le Mans 24h, Champion Racing Audi R8. American Champion Racing was one of the first customer teams from Audi. They had a very strong international driver line-up and a great recognizable livery. Unfortunately the car retired with a broken engine, very rare for the usually reliable Audi R8s.
#3 Johnny Herbert (GB) / Ralf Kelleners (D) / Didier Theys (B) – DNF
Champion Audi R8 (2000) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 600 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #405
- IXO Modern Le Mans & GT Cars LMM003 (diecast)
2001 Petit Le Mans, Champion Racing Audi R8. Johnny Herbert was accompanied by the experienced Andy Wallace in the Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta. The couple finished 3rd, behind the Joest and Johansson Audis.
#38 Johnny Herbert (GB) / Andy Wallace (GB) – 3rd
Champion Audi R8 (2000) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 600 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #405
- MINICHAMPS MC400 010938 (diecast)
2003 Le Mans 24h, Champion Racing Audi R8. The customer Audi’s from Team Audi UK, Champion Racing and Team Goh were underdogs in this year’s Le Mans. Bentley was favorite to win, and to do so they received the better Michelin tires. This Champion / Audi North America Audi finished 3rd in front of the Audi Japan sister car.
#6 J.J. Lehto (FIN) / Stefan Johansson (S) / Emanuele Pirro (I) – 3rd
Champion Audi R8 (2001) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #505
- IXO Modern Le Mans & GT Cars LMM050 (diecast)
2005 Sebring 12h, Champion racing Audi R8. The only competition that the Audi North America / Champion Racing Audi’s had was from their own teammates. Since Joest isn’t participating, the works drivers now drive for Champion. The #1 is the winning car, their teammates finished less than 7 seconds behind. The advantage on the third placed Lola was no less than 20 laps.
#1 Tom Kristensen (DK) / J.J. Lehto (FIN) / Marco Werner (D) – 1st
Champion Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #605
#2 Allan McNish (GB) / Frank Biela (D) / Emanuele Pirro (I) – 2nd
Champion Audi R8 (2001) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #505
- MINICHAMPS MC400 051301 limited 1008 pcs & MC400 051302 limited 1008 pcs (diecast)
2005 Le Mans 24h, Champion Racing Audi R8. The new aerodynamic rules penalized the Audi’s and now they had stiff competition from the Pescarolo’s which profited more from the new rules. But in the end it were Audi and #3 that won. The second Champion Audi had to settle for 3rd place as one of the Pescarolo’s slipped to second.
#3 Tom Kristensen (DK) / J.J. Lehto (FIN) / Marco Werner (D) – 1st
Champion Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #605
#2 Allan McNish (GB) / Frank Biela (D) / Emanuele Pirro (I) – 3rd
Champion Audi R8 (2001) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #505
- IXO Le Mans winners LM2005 (diecast)
- SPARK Audi Collection S0671 (resin)
Below are all Champion Racing cars including the Porsche GT2 #74 Daytona 1995, Porsche 911 GT1-evo #38 Daytona 2001 and Lola-Porsche B2K/10 #38 Daytona 2001.
Goh Racing – Audi Japan
2002 Le Mans 24h, Team Goh Audi R8. The customer Audi from Team Goh finished 7th. Well behind the factory cars from Joest that won Le Mans for the 3rd time in a row. The Joest Audi’s used the new direct injection FSI engine. while the old car used by Team Goh had to use the older engine.
#5 Yannick Dalmas (F) / Seiji Ara (J) / Hiroki Katoh (J) – 7th
Goh Audi R8 (2001) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 600 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #501
- IXO Modern Le Mans & GT Cars LMM036 (diecast)
2003 Le Mans 24h, Team Goh Audi R8. The customer Audi teams played second fiddle behind the Bentleys that had to win.
#5 Seiji Ara (J) / Jan Magnussen (DK) / Marco Werner (D) – 4th
Goh Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #602
- IXO Modern Le Mans & GT Cars LMM049 (diecast)
Also in 2003, Team Goh participated under the flag of Audi Belgian in this 1000km Spa Francorchamps race. The team won this combined FIA Sports Car Championship and British GT Championship race with ease.
#25 Tom Kristensen (DK) / Seiji Ara (J) – 1st
Goh Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #602
- MINICHAMPS MC430 031325 (diecast)
2004 Le Mans 24h, Team Goh Audi R8. The semi-works Audi’s from Team Veloqx, Champion Racing and Team Goh were the favorites in this year’s Le Mans. One of the Veloqx cars crashed, so did the Champion car. The battle went on between the remaining Veloqx Audi and this Audi Japan car, in which Kristensen won his 6th Le Mans.
#5 Tom Kristensen (DK) / Seiji Ara (J) / Rinaldo Capello (I) – 1st
Goh Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #602
- IXO Le Mans winners LM2004 (diecast)
Veloqx – Audi Sport UK
2003 Sebring 12h, Audi Sport UK Audi R8. The all new Bentley was the car to beat this year. In the first race of the year this is exactly what Audi did, the Joest entered car won the 12 hour race of Sebring. This Audi UK entry only managed 6th, behind two Audi’s and the Bentley’s, they even had to give way to a Panoz.
#9 Perry McCarthy (GB) / Mika Salo (FIN) / Johnny Kane (GB) – 7th
Veloqx Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #603
- IXO Modern Le Mans & GT Cars LMM051 (diecast)
2003 Le Mans 24h, Audi Sport UK Audi R8. Audi was the underdog, but this was the fastest of the Audi’s. The team retired early in the race because Biela missed the entrance of the pit lane and was forced to do another 9 mile lap, which he couldn’t complete ….
#10 Frank Biela (D) / Perry McCarthy (GB) / Mika Salo (FIN) – DNF
Veloqx Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #603
- MINICHAMPS MC400 031399 (diecast)
2004 Le Mans 24h, Audi Sport UK Audi R8. The semi-works Audi’s from Team Veloqx were among the favourites. The fastest Audi UK car finished in 2nd place 35 seconds behind the winning Goh Audi. McNish crashed his car and his teammates had to drive it after repairs to the finish together because McNish was not able to continue. They managed to finish in 5th spot after all.
#8 Allan McNish (GB) / Frank Biela (D) / Pierre Kaffer (D) – 5th
#88 Johnny Herbert (GB) / Guy Smith (GB) / Jamie Davies (GB) – 2nd
Veloqx Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #603 and #604
- IXO Modern Le Mans & GT Cars LMM059 & LMM060 (diecast)
Oreca – Audi France
2005 Le Mans 24h, Oreca Audi R8. Audi France entered an Audi R8 also for this year’s Le Mans. Last year’s Veloqx car was now raced by the experienced Oreca Team. The all French line-up couldn’t fight for the win but finished in a decent 4th place.
#4 Franck Montagny (F) / Stéphane Ortelli (MC) / Jean-Marc Gounon (F) – 4th
Oreca Audi R8 (2002) – 3.6 liter Audi V8 twin turbo, approx. 550 hp. Michelin tires. Weight 900 kg. Carbon fibre monocoque, chassisnr. Audi / Dallara #603
- SPARK Audi Collection S0673 (resin)
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