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Le Mans 24 Hours: Porsche leads Toyota after four hours

Brendon Hartley held onto the lead of the Le Mans 24 Hours for Porsche after four hours, running ahead of the Toyota of Stephane Sarrazin

Hartley took the #20 Porsche over from Timo Bernhard, and traded the lead with Sarrazin as they have been pitting out of sequence with each other, and everyone switched back from wet tyres to slicks.

The Porsche did a good job of keeping the Toyota around 20 seconds adrift for much of the most recent stint, but as they approached the four-hour mark Sarrazin started to take chunks of time out of the leading 919.

Benoit Treluyer also made inroads into the leader after being nearly one minute adrift, while Lucas di Grassi remained on the lead lap in the #1 Audi and Nicholas Prost's Rebellion completed the top five.

The #36 Signatech Alpine ORECA leads LMP2 in the hands of Paul-Loup Chatin, although it was about to make its fifth pitstop and lose first place at the turn of the hour.

Michel Frey, in the #34 Race Performance ORECA-Judd/BMW, has the box seat in the class after fighting off Alex Brundle's #35 Ligier in a lead battle, although Frey pitted shortly before the end of the hour.

With Brundle pitting and taking new tyres, the gap between the pair has extended.

The #41 Greaves Motorsport Zytek has officially retired after the crash it suffered with the #48 Murphy Prototypes ORECA, with the latter still being repaired in the pits.

Corvette regained the GTE lead, but the leading contenders from Porsche, Ferrari and Aston Martin are all within a minute of the #74 C7.R.

The Manthey Porsches had begun the hour in formation with Marco Holzer and Jorg Bergmeister first and second, before pitstops for both put the leading Am car of Patrick Long back on top.

Long, whose Dempsey Porsche stayed on slicks when others switched to wets in the previous hour, briefly reclaimed the GTE lead it had previously lost but was out of sync on pitstops and dropped out of the running when Long made way for Patrick Dempsey.

That elevated Bergmeister - who jumped Holzer in the pits - into first place in class, but Tommy Milner also passed the #92 during the stops and quickly hunted the lead 911 RSR down, getting by on the run from Mulsanne corner to Indianapolis.

The Porsches run second and third, with Toni Vilander fourth in the AF Corse Ferrari 458 that started from pole, with Aston Martin's sole Vantage just under half a minute back in fifth.

Aston is faring better in GTE Am, where it holds the lead courtesy of the #95 car of Kristian Poulsen. Dempsey, having taken over from Long, is second in class, just ahead of Archie Hamilton's Ram Ferrari.

POSITIONS AFTER 4 HOURS

Pos Cl       Car       Drivers                              Laps  Gap
 1. LMP1 #20 Porsche   Bernhard/Webber/Hartley              53  
 2. LMP1 #7  Toyota    Wurz/Sarrazin/Nakajima               53  +    13.357s
 3. LMP1 #2  Audi      Fassler/Lotterer/Treluyer            53  +    47.520s
 4. LMP1 #1  Audi      Di Grassi/Gene/Kristensen            53  +  1m38.648s
 5. LMP1 #12 Rebellion Prost/Heidfeld/Beche                 51  +     2 Laps
 6. LMP2 #34 Oreca     Frey/Mailleux/Lancaster              49  +     4 Laps
 7. LMP2 #36 Alpine    Chatin/Panciatici/Webb               49  +    36.292s
 8. LMP2 #46 Ligier    Thiriet/Badey/Gommendy               49  +  1m17.361s
 9. LMP2 #35 Ligier    Brundle/Mardenborough/Shulzhitskiy   49  +  1m29.704s
10. LMP2 #43 Morgan    Klien/Hirsch/Brandela                49  +  2m53.376s
11. LMP1 #14 Porsche   Dumas/Jani/Lieb                      49  +  3m13.154s
12. LMP2 #26 Morgan    Rusinov/Pla/Canal                    48  +     5 Laps
13. LMP2 #24 Oreca     Rast/Charouz/Capillaire              48  +    18.907s
14. LMP2 #47 Oreca     Howson/Bradley/Imperatori            48  +    33.395s
15. LMP2 #38 Zytek     Dolan/Tincknell/Turvey               48  +    54.812s
16. LMP2 #33 Ligier    Cheng/Tung/Fong                      48  +  2m31.369s
17. GTEP #74 Chevrolet Gavin/Milner/Westbrook               47  +     6 Laps
18. LMP2 #50 Morgan    Ragues/Taylor/Ihara                  47  +     1.369s
19. GTEP #91 Porsche   Pilet/Bergmeister/Tandy              47  +     7.977s
20. GTEP #92 Porsche   Holzer/Makowiecki/Lietz              47  +    24.352s
21. GTEP #51 Ferrari   Bruni/Vilander/Fisichella            47  +    34.269s
22. LMP2 #29 Morgan    Schell/Leutwiller/Roussel            47  +    38.720s
23. GTEP #97 Aston     Turner/Mucke/Senna                   47  +    49.068s
24. GTEP #73 Chevrolet Magnussen/Garcia/Taylor              47  +    57.480s
25. GTEA #98 Aston     Dalla Lana/Lamy/Nygaard              47  +  1m09.197s
26. GTEA #77 Porsche   Dempsey/Foster/Long                  47  +  2m22.976s
27. LMP2 #42 Zytek     Kimber-Smith/McMurry/Dyson           47  +  2m38.135s
28. GTEA #53 Ferrari   Mowlem/Patterson/Hamilton            47  +  2m51.742s
29. LMP1 #13 Rebellion Kraihamer/Belicchi/Leimer            47  +  2m59.867s
30. GTEA #72 Ferrari   Bertolini/Shaitar/Basov              46  +     7 Laps
31. GTEA #95 Aston     Poulsen/Heinemeier-Hansson/Thiim     46  +    12.990s
32. GTEA #88 Porsche   Ried/Bachler/Al Qubaisi              46  +  1m28.020s
33. GTEP #52 Ferrari   Griffin/Parente/Leo                  46  +  2m07.695s
34. GTEA #90 Ferrari   Montecalvo/Roda/Ruberti              46  +  2m28.808s
35. GTEA #70 Ferrari   Nakano/Ehret/Rich                    46  +  2m34.524s
36. GTEA #67 Porsche   Maris/Merlin/Helary                  46  +  2m40.168s
37. GTEA #61 Ferrari   Perez-Companc/Cioci/Venturi          46  +  2m54.856s
38. GTEA #66 Ferrari   Al Faisal/Neiman/Pumpelly            46  +  3m24.887s
39. GTEA #57 Ferrari   Krohn/Jonsson/Collins                45  +     8 Laps
40. GTEA #75 Porsche   Perrodo/Collard/Palttala             45  +    27.496s
41. GTEA #58 Ferrari   Barthez/Pons/Ayari                   45  +  1m09.767s
42. GTEA #60 Ferrari   Mann/Case/Giammaria                  45  +  1m14.125s
43. LMP1 #8  Toyota    Davidson/Lapierre/Buemi              45  +  2m16.770s
44. GTEP #79 Porsche   MacNeil/Curtis/Bleekemolen           43  +    10 Laps
45. GTEA #76 Porsche   Narac/Armindo/Hallyday               42  +    11 Laps
46. LMP2 #27 Oreca     Zlobin/Salo/Ladygin                  42  +  1m17.888s
47. GTEA #62 Ferrari   Mallegol/Bachelier/Blank             42  +  1m17.988s
48. LMP2 #48 Oreca     Berthon/Gonzalez/Chandhok            32  +    21 Laps
49. LMP2 #41 Zytek     Munemman/Latif/Winslow               31  Retired
50. GTEP #71 Ferrari   Rigon/Kaffer/Beretta                 28  Retired
51. LMP1 #3  Audi      Albuquerque/Bonanomi/Jarvis          25  Retired
52. GTEA #81 Ferrari   Wyatt/Rugolo/Bird                    22  Retired
53. LMP2 #37 Oreca     Ladygin/Minassian/Mediani            9   Retired
54. CDNT #0  Nissan    Ordonez/Reip/Motoyama                5   Retired

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