Peugeot in front at Petit Le Mans' halfway point
The remaining factory Peugeot led the Petit Le Mans 1000-mile enduro at Road Atlanta at half-distance
The #8 Peugeot 908 turbodiesel driven by Franck Montagny, Stephane Sarrazin and Alex Wurz held a one-minute lead after the best of the Audi R18s was handed a stop-go penalty.
Sarrazin and Audi driver Marcel Fassler had raced hard through the fourth hour, but the Peugeot gained a clear advantage when the German car, which is co-driven by Romain Dumas and Timo Bernhard, was awarded a 20-second stop-go penalty for a pitstop infringement.
The year-old ORECA Peugeot 908 driven by Nicolas Lapierre, Marc Gene and Nicolas Minassian held third place, one lap down on the two factory entries. The best petrol-powered LMP1 was the Aston Martin Racing Lola coupe, a further lap down in fourth place.
The #1 Audi shared by Allan McNish, Tom Kristensen and Rinaldo Capello was 43 laps down following two long stops for repairs after McNish clashed with a slower car. The Peugeot that had led the early going in the hands of Sebastien Bourdais went out with gearbox failure in the third hour.
The LMP2 leaderboard at 197 of the 394 laps was headed by the best of the Level 5 Motorsports HPDs. The car shared by Christophe Bouchut, Joao Barbosa and Scott Tucker returned to the lead after the Signatech ORECA-Nissan ran into power-steering problems.
The GT class was led by the Extreme Speed Motorsports Ferrari 458 Italia in the hands of Dominik Farnbacher after Andy Priaulx brought the #56 BMW M3 into the pits with its second left-rear puncture of the race on the stroke of half-distance.
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