Andre Lotterer: Two Le Mans victories very different

Last year Lotterer and team-mates Benoit Treluyer and Marcel Fassler had to represent Audi solo in a huge fight with Peugeot after the German firm lost its other two cars in enormous accident.

In the 2012 race, they initially battled against Toyota's new TS030 before getting embroiled in an ultra-close fight with the sister #2 Audi e-tron that only abated when Allan McNish crashed in the 22nd hour.

"Last year was very extraordinary. To be running alone after those two big accidents and the situation with Peugeot where we changed the lead almost 40 times and then the race went down to the wire with 13 seconds [gap]," said Lotterer. "For me, I'm more new in Le Mans so to be in that situation was amazing, so this year we had a bit more confidence within the team.

"We know we can trust each other even more and this gave us good potential. But you come to Le Mans and you can't expect to win, you just do your best and hope that it will work."

Lotterer added that the 2012 contest had been equally hard-fought even without Peugeot.

"It was amazing because it was a real race," he said. "Toyota was there at the beginning, we had competition with them, then unfortunately for them they retired, but then the race kept going on between the #2 car and us and it was tough racing.

"We were pushing really hard until the end and unfortunately Allan was a bit unlucky with some car and had to hit the wall and from then on we just had to bring the car home, but until then we really enjoyed the battle.

"We had some ups and down and Marcel had a few scratches on the car but I managed to get a gap again. It was flat out."