Apex Motorsport, formerly known as Audi Sport UK, was a British

auto racing Auto racing (also known as car racing, motor racing, or automobile racing) is a motorsport involving the racing of automobiles for competition. Auto racing has existed since the invention of the automobile. Races of various sorts were organise ...

team founded in 1996 by former racing driver Richard Lloyd in partnership with the

Volkswagen Group Volkswagen AG (), known internationally as the Volkswagen Group, is a German multinational automotive manufacturer headquartered in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. The company designs, manufactures and distributes passenger and commercial ...

. Formed to bring

Audi Audi AG () is a German automotive manufacturer of luxury vehicles headquartered in Ingolstadt, Bavaria, Germany. As a subsidiary of its parent company, the Volkswagen Group, Audi produces vehicles in nine production facilities worldwide. Th ...

into the

British Touring Car Championship The Kwik Fit British Touring Car Championship is a touring car racing series held each year in the United Kingdom, currently organised and administered by TOCA. It was established in 1958 as the British Saloon Car Championship and was renamed as ...

, the team won the teams and manufacturers titles in their debut season, as well as the drivers championship for German

Frank Biela Frank Stanley Biela (born 2 August 1964 in Neuss) is a German auto racing driver, mainly competing in touring cars and sportscar racing. He has raced exclusively in cars manufactured by the Audi marque since 1990. Career Biela started his care ...

with eight victories over the course of the season. Biela and Audi Sport UK finished the 1997 season in second for all three championships before the series banned the

four-wheel drive Four-wheel drive, also called 4×4 ("four by four") or 4WD, refers to a two-axled vehicle drivetrain capable of providing torque to all of its wheels simultaneously. It may be full-time or on-demand, and is typically linked via a transfer cas ...

systems that Audi utilized, forcing the team to redevelop a new car for

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently s ...

. The 1998 BTCC campaign was winless, and Audi Sport UK left the series at the end of the season to concentrate on

sports car racing Sports car racing is a form of motorsport road racing which utilises sports cars that have two seats and enclosed wheels. They may be purpose-built prototypes or grand tourers based on road-going models. Broadly speaking, sports car racing is ...

Audi Sport UK, in conjunction with

Racing Technology Norfolk In sport, racing is a competition of speed, in which competitors try to complete a given task in the shortest amount of time. Typically this involves traversing some distance, but it can be any other task involving speed to reach a specific goa ...

, developed and campaigned the

Audi R8C The Audi R8C is a Le Mans Prototype racecar that was built by Audi and designed by Peter Elleray to compete in the 1999 24 Hours of Le Mans under the LMGTP category. It was developed alongside the open Audi R8R LMP category spyder, prior to bein ...

for Audi's first attempt at the

24 Hours of Le Mans The 24 Hours of Le Mans (french: link=no, 24 Heures du Mans) is an endurance-focused sports car race held annually near the town of Le Mans, France. It is the world's oldest active endurance racing event. Unlike fixed-distance races whose ...

. The team failed to finish, in part due to a rushed schedule to complete the two cars. The team spent 2000 building cars for the American Speedvision World Challenge series but remained involved in Volkswagen's sports car program as Bentley, another Volkswagen Group brand, began developing their own entry for Le Mans. The team changed their name to Apex Motorsport and debuted the Bentley EXP Speed 8 in and finished with one car on the race podium. A fourth-place finish followed in before Apex joined with

Joest Racing Joest Racing is a sports car racing team that was established in 1978 by former Porsche works racer Reinhold Joest. Their headquarters are in Wald-Michelbach, Germany. Early years As a combined driver/team owner, Reinhold Joest first began t ...

, who had been running Audi's continued Le Mans program, to campaign two cars in 2003 at the 12 Hours of Sebring as well as Le Mans. Third and fourth places were earned at Sebring, while Team Bentley scored a one-two finish at Le Mans, with

Tom Kristensen Tom Kristensen (born 7 July 1967) is a Danish former racing driver. He holds the record for the most wins at the 24 Hours of Le Mans with nine, six of which were consecutive (from 2000 to 2005). In 1997, he won the race with the Joest Racing te ...

Rinaldo Capello Rinaldo "Dindo" Capello (born 17 June 1964) is an Italian professional racing driver. He is a three-time winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, with Bentley in 2003 and Audi in 2004 and 2008. Capello is a two-time American Le Mans Series champion, ...

, and Guy Smith driving the winning car. Bentley's program ended after the Le Mans victory, and Apex Motorsport was left without any Volkswagen Group programs and remained stagnant for two years. The team's assets were put up for auction in 2006 to no avail. Lloyd, along with racing driver and entrepreneur Harry Handkammer, approached Jaguar Cars to develop a

Group GT3 Group GT3, known technically as Cup Grand Touring Cars and commonly referred to as simply GT3, is a set of regulations maintained by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) for grand tourer racing cars designed for use in various au ...

sportscar program. Built around the

Jaguar XKR The Jaguar XK is a two-door 2+2 grand tourer manufactured and marketed by British automobile manufacturer Jaguar Cars from 1996–2014 in hatchback coupé and convertible bodystyles, across two generations. The XK was introduced at the ...

, Apex and Jaguar agreed to build cars for the team as well as cars to be sold to customers to justify the cost of the program. The team first raced the cars late in the 2007 season for the international

FIA GT3 European Championship The FIA GT3 European Championship was a sports car racing series organized by the Stéphane Ratel Organisation (SRO) and regulated by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). It was a championship derived from the international FIA ...

and

British GT Championship The British GT Championship is a sports car racing series based predominantly in the United Kingdom. The series was originally created by the British Racing Drivers' Club in 1993 and, for its first two seasons, was known as the National Sports GT ...

. While developing the Jaguars in March 2008, Lloyd and team member Christopher Allarton, along with racing driver David Leslie were en route to

Nogaro Circuit Circuit Paul Armagnac also known as Circuit de Nogaro is a motorsport race track located in the commune of Nogaro in the Gers department in southwestern France. The track is named in honor of Nogaro-born racing driver Paul Armagnac who died in ...

for testing when their aircraft

crashed "Crashed" is the third U.S. rock Single (music), single, (the fifth overall), from the band Daughtry (band), Daughtry's debut album. It was released only to U.S. rock stations on September 5, 2007. Upon its release the song got adds at those stat ...

near Biggin Hill. All three, plus two pilots, were killed in the crash. Despite the loss for the team, they continued their FIA GT3 campaign for the season, and pushed with further development of the car in 2009. However the project came to an early close in 2009 after no cars had been sold to customers and the team was dissolved by 2014.

References

{{reflist British auto racing teams Companies based in Buckinghamshire 1996 establishments in the United Kingdom 2014 disestablishments in the United Kingdom British Touring Car Championship teams British GT Championship teams 24 Hours of Le Mans teams American Le Mans Series teams Audi in motorsport British racecar constructors Jaguar in motorsport Auto racing teams established in 1996 Auto racing teams disestablished in 2014