Hour 2: Toyota Continues to Lead at Silverstone. Porsche and Aston Martin Fight for GTE lead

The second hour finished under the safety car to recover the stricken nr32 Lotus but continued to enthral the large crowd at Silverstone. The Toyota TS030 of Kazuki Nakajima continued to head the 35 car field ahead of the two Audi R18s with Benoit Treluyer in the nr1 Audi in second place and Allan McNish in the nr2 Audi in third. The R18 Ultra of McNish suffered a slow puncture and had to make an unscheduled pitstop on lap 61.

The LMP2 battle saw John Martin leading in the ADR-Delta Oreca-Nissan leading from the nr38 Jota Zytek Nissan of Nicolas Minassian and the nr24 Oak Racing Morgan-Nissan. The nr32 Lotus Lola of Kevin Weeda pulled off the track on the Hangar Straight with smoke pouring from the engine bay, bringing out the safety car to recover the car.

The LMGTE Pro class provided some of the most excitement during the second hour with the nr97 Aston Martin Racing Vantage of Stefan Mucke closing the gap to less than a second to the leading nr77 Felbermayr-Proton Porsche of Marc Lieb, with the nr51 AF Corse Ferrari of Giancarlo Fisichella keeping pace with the two lead cars.

LMGTE Am saw the nr50 Larbre Competition Corvette of Fernando Rees move to the front of the pack, with the two Aston Martin Vantage V8s of Jonathan Adam (nr99) and Stuart Hall (nr98) filling the top three places in the class. The nr57 Krohn Racing Ferrari spun across the track at Club after it was hit by the nr1 Audi which had to move sideways to avoid a slower car ahead.

At the end of the second 60-minutes the two Safety Cars were still on track.

Jeff Carter

Photo: TOWCESTER (NORTHAMPTONSHIRE, GREAT BRITAIN), SILVERSTONE CIRCUIT, 6 HOURS OF SILVERSTONE, SUNDAY 26TH AUGUST 2012, RACE.