24h Le Mans
It’s still anyone’s race in the battle to take home the 24 Hours of Le Mans centenary trophy. Five manufacturers have swapped lead since the race began at 4 pm local time. With differing tyre strategies, the main Hypercar challengers have moved up and down the rankings. Ferrari AF Corse, however, has appeared most consistently at the top of the standings with the #51 Ferrari 499P first to complete 100 laps. However, Alessandro Pier Guidi was caught out at the Daytona Chicane shortly before midnight.
After one hour 25 minutes, the Safety Car – brought out while repairs were made to the barriers damaged in the spell of rain – returned to base. In the first green lap after racing resumed, Yifei Ye went on the attack in the #38 Hertz Team JOTA Porsche 963, passing four cars and then wrestling the lead from Gustavo Menezes in the #94 Peugeot 9X8. Sadly for the Chinese driver, barely minutes later, he lost control coming out of the Porsche Curves, ramming his gold Porsche into the tyre barriers and leaving debris strewn all over the track. The incident resulted in a Full Course Yellow and left the Ferrari 499Ps in the top two spots.
Miraculously, given the battered state of the Porsche on entering the garage, the mechanics spent just 20 minutes getting back into shape and out on to the track. Meanwhile, the #5 Porsche 963 incurred a drive-through penalty for an infringement during the safety car period, and the #6 sister car with Kévin Estre at the wheel suffered a puncture. Not a happy hour for the German manufacturer.
The #72 TF Sport LMGTE Am challenger crashed heavily into the bank of tyres in the Porsche Curves with Arnold Robin at the wheel. The Aston Martin Vantage almost wipes out the #51 Ferrari 499P in the process. A retirement was unfortunately inevitable.
Shortly after 10 pm, rain began to fall again in the Tertre Rouge section as day turned into night. The #28 JOTA Oreca 07, which had slipped from the class lead to fifth since the FCY, was first to fall foul of the wet weather as the cars headed to the pits to change to grooved tyres. As the heavens opened, LMGTE Am class leader, the #66 JMW Motorsport Ferrari 488 GTE EVO, slid off into the gravel, propelling the Iron Dames back to the top of the standings. The #923 Racing Team Turkey Oreca 07 then skidded off and crashed into a stranded Prema Racing car.
The Cadillac V-Series Rs were also having trouble in the wet conditions. Shortly after Renger van der Zande had cut a corner across the gravel, Richard Westbrook spun in the #2 sister car but without any significant consequences.
As the rain eased off, lap times of the leaders fell from around 4:20 during the heaviest rainfall to under 4:00.
Former leader, the #75 Porsche 963 appeared to be in difficulty at Tertre Rouge while on its 85th lap. Frenchman Mathieu Jaminet pulled up on the inside of the track with what proved to be a fuel pressure issue. The Porsche Penske Motorsport car subsequently became the first retiree among the Hypercar field.
Surprisingly, given the number of incidents, just two LMP2 contenders have so far been forced to retire. The Nielsen Racing and Tower Motorsports Oreca 07s (#14 and #13 respectively) suffered heavy crashes in the early stages and were the day’s first two casualties. Inter Europol Competition’s #34 Oreca 07 took control of the LMP2 class after a series of collisions that pushed the #28 JOTA and the #9 Prema Racing machines down the standings. With Robert Kubica at the wheel of the Team WRT #41 Oreca, the Belgian outfit is in hot pursuit of its Polish counterparts.
Twenty-seven-year-old Italian Matteo Cairoli in the Project 1-AO Porsche 911 RSR-19 (#56) negotiated the tricky conditions well to move smoothly past the Iron Dames bright pink Porsche to take the LMGTE Am lead. This class has been hardest hit by retirements so far with six line-ups seeing their challenge ended prematurely.
As the clock ticked towards midnight, Alessandro Pier Guidi put the leading #51 Ferrari 499P into the gravel at the Daytona Chicane, leaving the #94 Porsche 9X8 to regain the lead.
Whenever there’s a proper downpour after dark at Le Mans, fans who know their Le Mans history spare a thought for Henri Pescarolo. In 1968, his Matra’s windscreen wipers stopped working amid torrential nighttime rain, yet he soldiered on heroically, maintaining his position despite the circumstances. When day broke he still lay second behind Lucien Bianchi and Pedro Rodríguez, who went on to win. “When I caught up with the car in front, I could vaguely make out the red of the rear lights in the spray, but I had no idea whether it was going straight on, right or left,” said the four-time Le Mans winner.
