Audi 2012 Annual Report Download - page 47

Technology and passion –
a dicult pairing. Is it
permissible for engineers
to allow passion into their
work? What should be used
to determine processes – feelings?
Or shouldn’t it rather be straight facts
based on scientific principles that tip
the scales?
Anyone who watches Leena Gade go
about her work quickly comes to the
opposite conclusion. Sound engineering
expertise is the prerequisite for good
work. Passion is the driving force.
On race weekends, she spends hour
after hour in deep concentration in the
Audi command post: for practice, for
Running the team
on a laptop: Leena
Gade monitors the
performance of “her”
boys at the 12 Hours
of Sebring race in
March 2012.
qualifying and during the endurance
races. And she doesn’t lose focus in the
intervals between, either. She questions
her drivers Marcel Fässler, André
Lotterer and Benoît Tréluyer in depth
about how the Audi R18 e-tron quattro
is driving. She plans workflows, talks
with other engineers, instructs the
mechanics, gives feedback to her drivers,
looks after every detail. There seems
to be 36 hours in her day, not 24.
But that is only one side of her work.
In the past, Gade worked out and about
for Audi primarily on race weekends.
Since 2012, she has lived in Ingolstadt
and is closely involved with the Audi
Sport test team when not at a race.
That is a fundamental dierence from
the position of a race engineer, who
concentrates primarily on the season’s
events. “Now I have an influence on
the development of a race car from
very early in the creation process. That
requires a lot of understanding and
empathy,” she says.
The 37-year-old British woman who
comes across as very modest and
grounded, almost seems to be a bit
astonished at where life has taken her.
“The Audi R18 e-tron quattro is an
incredibly complex car. A few years
ago, I would never have dreamed
that I would be working with such
a high-tech vehicle,” she says with
respect when describing the eleventh
Le Mans-winning Audi. Until 2008 she
was involved in a race series in which
all participants drive identical cars –
no comparison with the first hybrid
race car from Audi. For the last five
years, she has placed her engineering
expertise at the disposal of Audi.
“A few years ago I would never have dreamed that I would be
working with such a high-tech vehicle.”
Leena Gade with reference to the Audi R18 e-tron quattro, the winning car at Le Mans in 2012.
P H O T O S | A U D I AG
My Perfection
44