Petit Le Mans, Free practice 2 : Peugeot takes control

 

 

The cool of the night was already a distant memory, the cars of all classes were on track at 10 am (15:00 UK) for a free practice session of one hour, that was quickly interrupted by a red flag. After nine minutes, Olivier Pla, in trouble with the brakes of the OAK Pescarolo Judd #24, struck the #11 Porsche GTC driven by Will Langhorne. Fortunately both drivers were unhurt.

After a break of nearly forty minutes to clean the track, the session resumed, to be almost immediately stopped again, by a car stranded on the track in a potentially dangerous place. Competitors returned to the track after the interruption for a session extended until 11:30 (16:30 UK). The two Peugeot 908 quickly gained the upper hand to finish top of the timesheets at the end of the session.

With a time of 1'09''603, Stéphane Sarrazin in the Peugeot #8 was ahead of his teammate Simon Pagenaud in the #7 by a little over a tenth of a second. They were followed by the two Audis, #1 and #2 in about one second, but Tom Kristensen, was at the top of the screens for some time.

The battle between Nissan and Honda continues in LM P2, this time, Honda's advantage with Marino Franchitti in the #055 Level 5, one second faster than the Lucas Ordener in the Oreca-Nissan of Signatech. The the third fastest time was achieved by South African Mark Patterson in an OAK Pescarolo-Judd.

The battle at the top of LM GTE Pro is more turbulent than ever with nine cars in the same second. The Ferrari F458 of Rizi Competizione leads the pack, as in the first free practice session, this time Toni Vilander set a time of 1'20''205. The Finnish driver ahead of a BMW M3 GT with Dirk Müller and another Ferrari. 

Finally, the LM GTE Am was dominated by the Corvette of Larbre Competition in the hands of Julien Canal, followed closely by Richard Lietz, Porsche factory driver, here to reinforce the Proton team.

Business will resume this afternoon, 12:00 to 2:55 p.m. local time (7:55 p.m. UK) for a one-hour session. 

Cécile Bonardel

Photo : BRASELTON (GEORGIA, USA), ROAD ATLANTA, PETIT LE MANS, FREE PRACTICE, 29 SEPT 2011. The two Peugeots dominated the first session of the day.