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Pescarolo wins race one at Okayama

The Sora Racing Pescarolo of Christophe Tinseau and Shinji Nakano took victory in a closely-contested Asian Le Mans Series debut at Okayama today

The three-hour race was, for most of its duration, a tight three-way scrap between the Pescarolo, the ORECA of Nicolas Lapierre and Loic Duval and the Aston Martin Racing car of Stefan Mucke and Harold Primat.

The Aston led through much of the middle of the race and Mucke began the last hour in the lead. But the AMR car had to pit for a late splash and dash, and then stopped again when the front bodywork came loose - losing the lead with just over 10 minutes remaining.

The ORECA had lost time to the Pescarolo in each of its pitstops, but still Tinseau began the final stint just three seconds ahead of Duval. Once the Aston vacated the lead, he was able to gradually extend that margin through the traffic to finish seven seconds clear.

The Kolles Audi R10 of Oliver Jarvis and Christian Bakkerud completed the podium after passing the sister car of Christijan Albers, Hideki Noda and Matteo Cressoni mid-way through the race.

Stefan Mucke brought the stricken Aston Martin home in fourth place, two laps off the lead, with the second Kolles Audi two laps further back in sixth.

The pole-sitting Drayson Racing Lola finished sixth, despite dominating the early stages of the race. Jonathan Cocker sprinted away in the lead at the start and was well clear of Pescarolo, ORECA and Aston Martin after the first half hour. But he was forced to bring the car into the pits for a new nose when the lights failed.

Cocker rejoined three laps off the lead and later handed over to Paul Drayson, who brought the car home in sixth.

The Oak Racing Pescarolo won the LMP2 class in seventh place overall, keeping the Ibanez Racing Courage at arms length throughout the race - eventually beating it by just over 20 seconds.

The Team Nova GT1 Aston Martin stormed from the back of the grid to take the lead of the class in the first hour, but the Japanese Lamborghini Owners' Club Murcielago of Atsushi Yogo and Hiroyuki Iiri responded and reclaimed the lead. Yogo was able to pull the car 30 seconds clear of the Aston by the end.

The Larbre Saleen was also in the GT1 lead battle for much of the race, but the car had a suspension problem with 45 minutes to go and could only limp back to retire in the pits.

The closest battle of the race, though, was reserved for the GT2 class. The Rahal/Letterman Racing BMW of Dirk Muller and Tom Milner swapped the lead back and forth with the Felbermayr-Proton Porsche of Marc Lieb and Wolf Henzler - trading paint on a couple of occasions. But the BMW eventually triumphed by just 0.2 seconds across the line at the end.

Allan Simonen brought the Farnbacher Ferrari home third in GT2, with the second Felbermayr Porsche narrowly beating the Jimgainer Racing Ferrari to fourth.

Pos  Drivers                     Class  Car                  Laps
 1.  Tinseau/Nakano              LMP1   Pescarolo-Judd        126
 2.  Lapierre/Duval              LMP1   Courage-ORECA-AIM     126
 3.  Jarvis/Bakkerud             LMP1   Audi                  125
 4.  Mucke/Primat                LMP1   Lola-Aston Martin     124
 5.  Cressoni/Noda/Albers        LMP1   Audi                  122
 6.  Drayson/Cocker              LMP1   Lola-Judd             121
 7.  Nicolet/Hein/Lahaye         LMP2   Pescarolo-Mazda       116
 8.  Toulemonde/da Rocha/Ibanez  LMP2   Courage-AER           116
 9.  Wakisaka/Mitsuyama          LMP1   Courage-ORECA-YGK     115
10.  Yogo/Iiri                   GT1    Lamborghini           113
11.  Muller/Milner               GT2    BMW                   113
12.  Lieb/Henzler                GT2    Porsche               113
13.  Tsuzuki/Tsuchiya            GT1    Aston Martin          113
14.  Farnbacher/Simonsen         GT2    Ferrari               113
15.  Ried/Holzer                 GT2    Porsche               112
16.  Tanaka/Hiranaka             GT2    Ferrari               112
17.  Aoki/Fujii                  GT2    Ferrari               111
18.  Kinoshita/Kageyama          GT2    Porsche               109
19.  Robertson/Robertson/Murry   GT2    Ford                  108
20.  Lee/Ma/Enge                 GT2    Aston Martin          107

Retirements

     Berville/Lemeret/van Dam    GT1    Saleen                 81
     Yamanishi/Sakamoto          GT1    Lamborghini            37
     Kojima/Hori/Kimura          GT2    Porsche                 3

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