RSR team owner Paul Gentilozzi has revealed that he has spoken to Nigel Mansell about racing his new factory-backed Jaguar XKR GT2 in the 2010 American Le Mans Series.
Former Champ Car World Series co-owner Gentilozzi has made it clear that he wants a British driver to race one of the new GT2 machines, unveiled during the Petit Le Mans event at Road Atlanta, and is hoping to entice the 1992 Formula 1 world champion into his squad.
"I ran in to Nigel Mansell at Le Mans this year, and we knew each other from our Champ Car days," Gentilozzi said at Road Atlanta "He said, 'I'm excited to hear about what you are doing,' and so on. So I said, 'You should come race with us,' and he said, 'I'd love to, are you serious?'
"We'd always talked and when I was in Trans-Am, Nigel always wanted to come and drive our car, because they are great fun and have loads of power. And at Le Mans he told me that he wanted to come back and with his son. They would like to race in the U.S.
"We've had a talk, we are going to talk more and it may just end up as that, a talk among friends. We will see."
Mansell recently made his sports car racing debut in a Ginetta LMP1 prototype alongside his son Greg in the recent Le Mans Series race at Silverstone.
"We have talked to a lot of British drivers," said Gentilozzi. "Johnny Mowlem is here [at the launch], we have talked to drivers all over the world, but our intention would be to have a British driver."