American Le Mans Series

Sebring 12 Hours – Eleventh and Twelfth Hour Report

© American Le Mans Series

The Sebring 12 Hours has gone into its final two hours and it is now fully dark out on the circuit. We are heading towards an historical victory here in Florida as the top five is still 100% LMP2. In the infield and around the parkings the fans have lit up their campfires as we go into the night, we at Planetlemans will do our best to keep you informed in this final part of the race.

The top four has just made their pit stops and so we will be having track action for a while now, let’s return to the race.

20:07- The Penske Porsche is back in the lead after the pit stops. Romain Dumas has taken over from Emmanuel Collard.

20:08- Only one pit stop left to do this race for the Penske Porsche. We do not want to jinx their luck, but it seems more and more likely that Penske can finally beat the LMP1 cars on what is called an ‘LMP1-track’.

20:12- McNish is 3 to 4 seconds a lap quicker than the cars in front of him at the moment. With two hours remaining, what can Audi do…

20:16- Two fast cars from the early hours of the race, Peugeot and the AGR Acura, are still in the pit losing valuable time. The Acura is now 6 laps down, with Peugeot already 26 laps behind the leaders.

20:20- End of the race for the Andretti Green Racing Acura. The problems on the car can not be solved and the car will be stuck in the pitlane. Luckily for them they have already done more than 70% of the race distance so they will be able to score points

20:22- Fernandez and Lally battle for position. Fernandez gets ahead of Lally briefly, but Lally gets back along the Mexican. Both drivers are fighting for that second place.

20:24- The #26 Acura is rolling down pit lane, pushed by the mechanics. It is now also shown on the timing as “Retired”.

20:27- Lally and Fernandez going into Turn 10 side by side, the Mexican having the best line. Fernandez stays on the throttle and passes the Dyson Porsche to take second place.

20:30- Fernandez is getting away from Lally, in two laps time the gap has grown to almost 3.5 seconds already. Will Fernandez be able to close the gap to the Penske Porsche. 300 laps completed.

20:35- Mike Rockenfeller in the #2 Audi is in the box, routine stop for Audi. Rocky gets out of the car and Marco Werner gets in for his final stint.

20:40- Kristensen in the car after McNish hands him the car after coming in for a regular stop.

20:42- Fernandez is now 26 seconds behind the Porsche RS Spyder of Romain Dumas. Will he be able to catch the French driver before the checkered flag comes out?

20:45- O’Connell is still leading the GT1 category by miles. The #3 Corvette was the only GT1 car that did not have any problems. In GT2 Lizards still have a 1-2 on the cards, we suspect some fingers crossed at the team.

20:47- Didier Theys is in the pitbox in the Horag Porsche, the LMS team is seventh overall, sixth in LMP2.

20:49- Romain Dumas lost four seconds on his last lap after he got stuck behind the Tafel and Krohn-Risi Ferrari’s. The gap to Fernandez is now 21 seconds. Both cars still have one pit stop left…

20:50- Nathan Swartzbaugh, #5 VICI Racing, in the pits. He is currently fourth.

20:52- Adrian Fernandez is in the pit lane in what could be his final pit stop. Fuel only, no tyres. One hours and thirteen minutes remaining, he might have to do a splash-and-dash later on.

20:54- Guy Smith coming onto the pit lane, from third place. Tyres and fuel for the Porsche. Race leader Dumas passes the pit, staying out for another lap.

20:58- Bergmeister and the leading Lizard Porsche are in the pit. Full service for the GT2 car and a driver change. Marc Lieb takes over

20:59- Race leader Romain Dumas is in. Refueling is taking place, new tyres are mounted on the car. Dumas fires up the Porsche and races out of the pit. With an hour and five minutes to go, will he be able to make it to the finish without another stop?

21:00- Allan Simonsen has moved into fourth in the GT2 category, as the VICI Racing car has not come out of the pit after its stop.

21:05- ONE HOUR REMAINING: The Dyson Racing Porsche of Andy Lally is leading, but he still has to make a stop, so he will be dropping back after that stop. Second at the moment is Romain Dumas in the Penske Porsche, ahead of Adrian Fernandez and Guy Smith. Kristensen is just over a lap down on the leader.

21:07- Andy Lally comes in and hands over the car to Butch Leitzinger, strange decision by the team as Lally was doing well. New tyres and a new load of fuel. This driver change will have cost them some time.

21:08- Pedro Lamy is touring the track again in the Peugeot 908. He is currently 14th overall…behind the GT2 Porsche of Marc Lieb. Not exactly where they wanted to be…

21:11- Fernandez is only 11 seconds behind Dumas. An exciting last 45 minutes are coming up.

21:13- Adrian Fernandez is flying, the gap has gone back to just over 8 seconds. Question is, will he have to make another stop?

21:15- O’Connell is in for his final pit stop. Looks like he is going to win Sebring again!

21:19- Fernandez seven seconds behind…

21:20- Didier Theys and his Horag Racing Porsche RS Spyder, seventh overall, is in for what should be their final pit stop.

21:22- More pit stops as Darren Law takes the #44 Lizard Porsche (2nd in the GT2 class) onto pitroad.

21:23- Despite their bad luck the Peugeot is still really fast. It is several seconds a lap quicker than the other cars. If only they did not have problems…

21:25- Marco Werner has made his final stop. They have now dropped behind the Horag Porsche.

21:26- Fernandez has lost some ground, he is now 10 seconds behind Dumas. Tom Kristensen is in third place overall, one minute behind the Acura.

21:28- Tom Kristensen in the box. This will be the most important stop in the race for the Audi team, with 35 minutes remaining they are still hoping for a win.

21:31- Five cars are still in for the win here…after 11,5 hours of racing. Dumas is now 13 seconds ahead of Fernandez.

21:32- Not running at the front, but worth to mention is the Primetime Race Group Dodge Viper. They are currently running fifth in the GT2 category.

21:37- Even though the Audi is quicker than the LMP2 cars at the moment it seems hard to believe that they will be able to catch up with the Penske car before the finish. Fernandez is staying at around 14 seconds behind Dumas.

21:40- The fastest cars at the track right now are the Audi and the Peugeot. While Peugeot is racking up the miles in preparation of Le Mans, the guys at Audi are probably hoping for a full course caution. At the moment everything points to a Porsche victory overall/LMP2 and GT2.

21:44- Jan Lammers spins the Horag Racing Porsche. Fortunately for him the car keeps running and he quickly returns to the track. Fernandez is on his way for his final pit stop.

21:45- Here comes Fernandez. Fuel only. As the fuelhose gets out Fernandez briefly stalls the Acura…but quickly recovers and is on his way again.

21:47- Romain Dumas in for his final and most imporant pit stop. No problem for the Penske driver and he’s back out. All the three frontrunners have now made their final pit stop…

21:50- Fifteen minutes remaining. Tom Kristensen is still pushing hard, but he will not win this year, unless we have a caution but that is highly unlikely. Dumas has a ‘comfortable’ 16 seconds lead over Fernandez.

21:52- Final stops for the #45 Lizards Porsche and #008 Bell Motorsports Aston Martin.

21:55- Guy Smith is in the pit box for his splash-and-dash. This will give fourth place to the #1 Audi Sport North America R10.

21:56- Smoke coming from the #20 Dyson Racing Porsche RS Spyder which is currently third overall. Five minutes ago the Audi was behind the two Dyson cars, will it be ahead at the finish?

21:58- Despite the smoke Leitzinger is not losing a lot of speed. Power steering fluid is reported to cause the problem.

22:00- The Autocon Creation and PTG Panoz have been officially retired.

22:03- As Romain Dumas crosses the line he is shown the white flag…one lap to go! Porsche is set for another landmark victory.

22:06- VICTORY for Team Penske! 20 years after Klaus Ludwig and Hans Stück won the Sebring 12 Hours in a Porsche 962, Romain Dumas crosses the finish line to win Sebring for Porsche and Penske.

22:07- O’Connell crosses the line in the Corvette to take his seventh Sebring victory. Marc Lieb completes his lap and wraps it up for Flying Lizard Motorsports in GT2. Kristensen takes the LMP1 win for Audi.

There are two huge winners here today at Sebring: Porsche takes the overall win (and LMP2) with the RS Spyder and their brand new 2008-spec 997 GT3 RSR takes the GT2 category. The other one is Michelin which supplied tyres to all four class winners! They score their tenth consecutive overall victory here at Sebring.