United Sportscar Petit Le Mans: GTLM Porsches put to back of grid

Earl Bamber had put the #912 car he shares with Jorg Bergmeister and Frederic Makowiecki on pole in Friday's wet qualifying session but then crashed while pushing to further improve his time.

Despite the consequent deletion of his best lap as a penalty for causing a red flag, his second-fastest time still stood for class pole.

Further inspection of the crash damage then revealed that a change to a back-up chassis would be required overnight, resulting in a demotion to the rear of the field.

That should have elevated the #911 car of team-mates Nick Tandy, Richard Leitz and class championship leader Patrick Pilet to GTLM pole, but their car failed post-qualifying ride-height checks and was also lost its grid position.

Oliver Gavin and Tommy Milner therefore pick up GTLM pole for Corvette.

All three GTLM Porsches will start at the back as the Falken car failed to set a qualifying time after a crash for Bryan Sellers.

Pilet goes into the race with a three-point championship lead over BMW duo Bill Auberlen and Dirk Werner.

Corvette pair Jan Magnussen and Antonio Garcia, Risi Ferrari's Giancarlo Fisichella and Pierre Kaffer and second BMW crew Lucas Luhr and John Edwards are also in title contention in the series finale.