24 Hours of Le Mans

Le Mans 24 Hours - Second qualifying report

© Planetlemans - Marcel ten Caat

An incident packed first two hours of the second qualifying day at Le Mans was cut short by a red flag about fifteen minutes before the session was due to end. With several cars stranded out on the circuit and marshalls doing their work the race director decided it was enough and ended the session.

In the opening minutes of the session it was the number 5 Team Oreca Matmut that went into the barriers at the second of the Mulsanne chicanes. The car stopped on the middle of the track with a damaged front and as marshalls rushed to get the car out of the way the red flag was shown.

After the session was restarted the Audi R10s improved their lap times but the top remained the same with the Peugeot not going below 3:20. Having had a poor start on Wednesday the Charouz Racing System Lola was in the right rhythm again and quickly went up in the ranking.

Then incidents marred the session. First it was the Team Modena Aston Martin DBR9 that lost a wheel coming out of the second chicane and the car was stranded by the side of the road. Then the Peugeot of Ricardo Zonta hit the wall on the right side of the track at Karting, a hit that damaged the right side of the car. To finish it off it was Stuart Hall in the Creation CA07 AIM who made a mistake. As a result the car slammed into the wall damaging the front and rear of the car littering the track with debris. The red flag came out and the first session was not restarted.

The missing fifteen minutes were added to the second session and as a result the second session lasted two hours and fifteen minutes. The extra time did not bring any exciting times though and the provisional pole time set yesterday by Peugeot was unchanged.

As the session ended at midnight it was therefore the number 8 Team Peugeot Total Peugeot 908 of Wurz, Sarrazin and Lamy which claimed the pole position for the 76th Le Mans 24 Hours ahead of the numbers 9 and 7 Peugeot sister cars. The improvement by the Charouz Lola continued in the second part of the session and resulted in the team beating the number 1 Audi and taking sixth overall.

In LMP2 Maassen (Team Essex) and Verstappen (Van Merksteijn Motorsport) were close to each other as Dunlop and Michelin fought for the LMP2 pole, butd espite an engine change between the two sessions, the Dutch team beat the Team Essex car by 1.1 seconds. The Barazi Epsilon Zytek 07S will start from third in class.

No major changes in the two prototype classes but the grid was completely changed in the GT category with lots of teams improving their times and climbing up the ranks.

First in GT1 was the number 63 Corvette Racing C6.R taking the pole position in 3:47.668, even beating two LMP1 cars. The Larbre Competition Saleen S7R took second place on the grid, just a tenth of a second behind the Corvette. Third on the GT1 grid will be the number 64 Corvette which ended the day nine tenths of a second behind the number 63.

Like in LMP2 it was Porsche taking the first two places in GT2. The IMSA Performance Porsche 997 GT3 RSR, winner of the race in 2007, was quickest in 3:58.152. Second fastest was the Team Felbermayr-Proton Porsche almost nine tenths behind the IMSA car. Third fastest was the Virgo Motorsport Ferrari 430, the last car to quicker than 4 minutes.

Top times per class after Wednesday and Thursday:

LMP1
8 Peugeot 3.18.513
9 Peugeot 3.18.682
7 Peugeot 3.20.451
2 Audi 3.23.847
3 Audi 3.24.287

LMP2
34 van Merksteijn Porsche 3.32.301
31 Essex Porsche 3.33.441
32 Barazi Zytek 3.35.344
33 Speedy-Sebah Lola 3.35.401
45 Embassy 3.39.926

GT1
63 Corvette 3.47.668
50 Larbre Saleen 3.47.761
64 Corvette 3.48.539
009 Aston Martin 3.48.994
007 Aston Martin 3.49.060

GT2
76 IMSA Porsche 3.58.152
77 Felbermayr Porsche 3.59.072
96 Virgo Ferrari 3.59.820
80 Flying Lizard Porsche 4.00.106
90 Farnbacher Ferrari 4:01.464
82 Risi Ferrari 4.01.598