24 Hours of Le Mans – 12 Hour Report
The first half of the 86th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans has been completed and the No.7 Toyota TS050 HYBRID of José Maria Lopez is leading the race by 77 seconds ahead of the No.8 Toyota of Fernando Alonso.
The No.8 Toyota was penalised with a 60 second stop and go penalty when Sébastien Buemi was found to have driven too fast in a slow zone.
The No.3 Rebellion Racing R13 of Matthias Beche is running in third place, four laps behind the Toyotas and ahead of the No.1 Rebellion of Bruno Senna. The No.17 SMP Racing BR1-AER was running at the front of the field but Matevos Isaakyan spun at the Porsche Curves damaging the car. The Russian tried to clear the damaged parts of the car to get back to the pits but the damage caused the engine to fail in spectacular style in a cloud of smoke and the race for the No.17 was over.
In the LMGTE Pro category the two Porsche GT Team 911s continue to lead the class, with the No.92 of Michael Christensen holding a 1m 53s advantage over the No.91 of pole sitter Gimmi Bruni. The No.68 Ford GT is third and the No.52 AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE of Toni Vilander is fourth.
The No.81 BMW M8 GTE was handed a drive through penalty when the team refuelled the car while it was on skates and the earth lead wasn’t attached to the car during the refuelling process.
The No.26 G-Drive Racing ORECA is still in charge in the LMP2 category with Roman Rusinov circulating one lap ahead of the rest of the field. Nicolas Lapierre is currently second in the No.36 Signatech Alpine A470, 3 seconds ahead of the Panis Barthez Competition Ligier of Timothé Buret.
Porsche continues to dominate the LMGTE Am class as well as the Pro category and, at the end of the midway point in the race, the No.77 Dempsey-Proton Racing Porsche of Julien Andlauer was over 90 seconds ahead of the Ferraris of Keating Motorsports and JMW Motorsport.
The No.98 Aston Martin Racing Vantage was another retirement in the second quarter when Paul Dalla Lana went off into the barriers at the Porsche Curves. The Canadian was unhurt but the car had to be recovered to a safe area, its race being over.
CLICK HERE for the result from the first 12 hours of racing at the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
