After saying goodbye at Le Mans, this week’s visit to Road Atlanta has given us a chance to catch up with LeMansLive’s star pundit, Emanuele Pirro. The Italian driver hasn’t exactly been idle over the summer months…

Emanuele Pirro profited from the summer to delve into motor racing history, while also playing a hands-on part in helping the emergence of new, green automotive technologies.

“Two events I hate to miss are the visits to Goodwood in the south of England; the Goodwood Festival of Speed in July and the Goodwood Revival a couple of weeks ago. Absolutely anybody who is interested in motor sport has just got to sample either or both of these events at least once. For me, this year’s ‘Revival’ was unforgettable. I got to drive the Matra in which Jackie Stewart won his first Formula 1 world title in 1969, the Maserati that won Indy in 1939 and 1940, and the Ligier JS11 that Jacques Lafitte drove to two F1 wins in 1979. Oh, there was also the Martini Lancia I won Daytona with, along with Finotto and Facetti in 1981! That brought back so many memories; I had won the previous year’s Formula Abarth in Italy and my prize was a works drive in the Daytona 24. It was only my second season, and my very first race outside of Italy!”

Earlier in the year, at May’s Historic Monaco Grand Prix, the five-time Le Mans winner had been reunited with the Formula 3 car with which he won in the Principality in 1981. Thirty years later, he finished on the top step of the podium in exactly the same car in the race for historic F3 cars from the 1971-1984 period.

The Italian’s activities over the summer weren’t only associated with the past, however. In August, for example, he came second in the ALMS round at Salt Lake City, stepping in at the last minute for the injured Paul Drayson to team up with Jonny Cocker.

Meanwhile, he played an active role, too, in the victory of the Edison 2 prototype in the Michigan-based Automotive 100 MPG XPrize, which carried a top prize of $5 million for the company behind the winning project. The lightweight, futuristic car, which averaged fuel consumption of 128 miles per gallon (2.2 litres/100km!) in the motorway phase of the event, was designed by none other than Olivier Kuttner, Emanuele’s former race engineer at Audi.

Emanuele Pirro, Petit Le Mans