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24 Hours of Le Mans
2022 Le Mans 24 Hours Live Commentary and Updates
Live updates for the 2022 Le Mans 24 Hours at the Circuit de la Sarthe
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Pitlane traffic delays the #8 Toyota from leaving its box, as the #79 WeatherTech Porsche comes into the pit at the same time, meaning Hartley has to stop and be turned by the mechanics to get back on the road.
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Outside of the Toyota fight for the win, the best of the action is in both GT classes. The #64 Corvette still leads in GTE Pro but within 30s both the #92 Porsche and #51 Ferrari, and in GTE Am the #79 WeatherTech Porsche has a handful of seconds over the #99 Hardpoint Porsche.
At the front, Conway in the #7 Toyota continues to lead by 14 seconds ahead of Buemi in the sister #8 car. With a four-lap lead on the #709 Glickenhaus in third place, it looks like a straight fight to the finish for the Toyotas.
Penalty
It's less of a good morning for the #31 WRT who has been given a drivethrough penalty for hitting the #10 Vector. Gelael was trying to lap Bourdais and two-into-one didn't go so they both went around, with the stewards putting Gelael at fault. The penalty has dropped the #31 WRT to from third to seventh in class.
Thanks very much Richard, it is amazing what a shower and breakfast can do to refresh your mind. We're into the thick of the early morning action now in the final nine hours of the race - that's basically a sprint.
Just about seven o'clock on Sunday morning at La Sarthe, and I'm about to hand over to the bright-eyed, bushy-tailed (I assume?) Haydn Cobb for the next stint. A quick wrap of the state of play before I go:
It's still a Toyota 1-2 up at the front, with Mike Conway heading Sebastien Buemi by 15 seconds. There's no real threat from the #709 Glickenhaus in third place. Meanwhile, the #38 Jota car continues its dominant display at the front of LM P2, even though the slower Roberto Gonzalez is currently at the wheel. Robert Kubica is the best part of a lap behind him in the Prema Orlen Team car, with the #31 WRT entry now up to third despite its penalty at the start of the race.
It's back-and-forth in GTE PRO, with the #64 Corvette of Tommy Milner currently leading the #92 Porsche of Michael Christensen and, not far behind, the #52 AF Corse Ferrari with Daniel Serra at the wheel. Weathertech Racing is back at the top in GTE Am, but this is set to wax and wane as pitstops are currently in progress.
The grandstands opposite the Toyota pits are almost entirely empty as first Mike Conway and then Sebastien Buemi come in for fuel only. That's normal at this time in the morning...but they'll be packed in by the time the race finishes. Will it be a tight one? At the moment, Conway is 19 seconds ahead. Does either of these cars have a slip-up in them?
There's a coming-together between LM P2 racers Sean Gelael and Sebastien Bourdais at the first chicane. Both are briefly stuck on the road, facing the wrong way, but both get on the move again. Rather unnecessary for cars split by a few laps, you'd think.
Joshua Pierson gives up the #23 United Autosports car to Oliver Jarvis. The 16-year-old has had a respectable race so far, completing 64 laps with aa quickest of 3m34.480s. Alex Lynn has set the team's quickest lap at 3m32.961, completing 94 laps.
JMW Motorsport driver Mark Kvamme just slid out of control and into the gravel at Mulsanne. But the GTE Am back-marker manages to escape under his own steam.
The #92 Porsche does indeed now grab back the lead in GTE PRO as the #51 Ferrari makes its stop as well. Daniel Serra takes over the car from Alessandro Pier Guidi. It drops to third, now 20 seconds down on Tommy Milner in the Corvette.
A little housekeeping: the slow zone at Mulsanne has gone away and the Panis Racing car is running again. It's also now fair to say we're racing in daylight, soft and golden though it may be.
Nice though that last tweet from Corvette is, nothing stays the same for long at Le Mans! The C8.R briefly took the class lead but has just come into the pits, putting it back into third.
Cars 43 and 52 will have five seconds added to their next pit stops due to infringements at previous ones, says race control. That's the Inter Europol (not to be confused with Interpol) Competition LM P2 car and the second of the GTE PRO AF Corse Ferraris.
The three-way at the front of GTE PRO is good fun for now, though the Ferrari and Corvette are due in soon. Meanwhile a suitable machine is winching the Panis car out of the gravel, and the slow zone should be over shortly.
Oops, Panis Racing in trouble! Jamin has gone off at Mulsanne Corner, where he's spinning his rear tyres in vain for the moment. That puts us back in slow zone mode - but this one won't last as long.
Porsche have pulled the #92 GTE Pro leader into the garage for a rapid-fire brake change. Kevin Estre has also jumped out, ceding to Michael Christensen. Estre reports that the car is running well, but didn't enjoy the slow zones in the dawn cool, which robbed it of too much tyre temperature. Three seconds now blanket the top three in the category, with the #51 AF Corse leading the #64 Corvette and Christensen.
There's wheel to wheel action at the sharp(ish) end of GTE Am, with Alessio Picariello passing Julien Andlauer for second place. Marco Sorensen continues to lead this pair of Porsches in his TF Sport Aston Martin.
The race has now gone fully green, with licence to race through the Porsche Curves at long last. The #35 car that made the mess three quarters of an hour ago is up and running again, by the way. Somewhat surprisingly considering the crash, Jean-Baptiste Lahaye continues to drive. Well, he did have a fair amount of time to gather his thoughts during the repair job in the garage.
Mike Conway has stretched his lead over team-mate Sebastien Buemi to over thirty seconds. But with ten hours and ten minutes to go, we can expect more twists in the Toyota scrap. The #709 Glickenhaus is running solidly in third with Franck Mailleux 'au volant', but has now dropped to a three-lap deficit. There's simply been no let-up from the lead pair.
The Penske and Panis cars just pitted together, as is their habit. And following this, Jamin is 10 seconds up on Collard. The Penske stop was slower by roughly that time. The slow zone in the Porsche Curves continues!
Alexander West is leaning against the side of his stricken Ferrari 488, waiting patiently. Apparently someone from the team is on the way with a spanner, screwdriver and possibly some higher-tech tools. Hope that he can get going is not lost.
If you're looking for a close battle on track whilst the slow zone continues to interrupt the race rhythm, the Penske/Panis scrap in LM P2 continues to deliver. Just half a second splits fourth-in-class Emmanuel Collard and the chasing Nicolas Jamin.
The slow zone at the Porsche Curves is a lengthy one...it's been active for over 20 minutes now. As sunlight creeps up on La Sarthe, there's no danger of fastest laps at the moment.
And there has indeed been a change at the top of the field following driver changes for both cars! Mike Conway (#7) now leads Sebastien Buemi (#8) by 26 seconds. That must be down to the slow zones in operation during the staggered Toyota stops: not only at the Porsche Curves (still in force), but the one that briefly appeared in the middle sector thanks to that Inception Ferrari. This last has now been wheeled behind the barriers.
The #59 Inception Racing Ferrari might not be going any further in this race. It's stuck out in the country, somewhere short of Mulsanne Corner. Alexander West was crawling, then stopped completely at the right edge of the track. If he can't get going, this might ultimately turn into the fourth official retirement. We're still waiting for the third, of the #777 Aston Martin, to be posted -- that car is in the garage and 103 laps down on the overall lead.
Kamui Kobayashi is within a second of Ryo Hirakawa now -- and pitstops are imminent for the leading pair.
The #35 car has had quite the crash in the Porsche Curves! Jean-Baptiste Lahaye has gone nose first into the barriers on the inside of a left-hand sweeper, then takes out a trackside polystyrene marker on the rebound. He makes it back to the pits despite the impact -- there's a new front going on the car. But there is a lot of debris on track, so a slow zone has been declared. Marshals are currently kicking and sweeping the mess away.
I'm enjoying seeing Jonathan Aberdein in the thick of the LM P2 fight for Jota. I grew up watching his old man Chris drive monstrous modified saloons in South Africa. He's just jumped to third after pit stops for Penske and Panis.
The gap at the very head of the race is now down to 4 seconds, though the pace has eased off just a fraction. Race fans will be hoping - possibly in vain - that there will continue to be a real fight between the Toyotas all the way to the flag.
Antonio Fuoco has an off-track moment in the AF Corse Ferrari, but manages to hold it all together. Meanwhile, mechanics up and down the pit lane are having to nudge each other awake to get ready for the next scheduled pitstops. One unfortunate Ferrari man might not get up so elegantly: he has had his legs bound together by impish colleagues...and a large cable tie.
Rene Rast has passed Manu Collard to move up to fifth spot in LM P2. This part of the leaderboard continues to ebb and flow as it has all race - but the same cannot be said of the class lead. That still belongs to the hitherto relentless Jota #38 car, currently in the hands of Antonio Felix da Costa.
Harry Tincknell is on a pre-dawn tear in the Dempsey-Proton Racing Porsche, setting its fastest lap of the race and then bettering it the next time around. They're fifth in class, but still on the same lap as the leading TF Sport Aston Martin.
Teams are celebrating the halfway mark...apart from the three GTE Am cars that are now out of the race. They'll be counting down to daylight as well - it'll be bright within the hour.
Another pair of pitstops completed for Toyota Gazoo Racing. There was a seven-second loss there for the #8 car, with Toyota's neighbour in pitlane pitting at an inconvenient moment and costing the leader time. So Kobayashi is within seven seconds of Hirakawa and it's game on again.
For those who haven't been religiously reading our every word on the live feed since yesterday afternoon...here's the halfway race report! https://www.autosport.com/le-mans/news/le-mans-24-hours-slow-zone-breaks-up-toyota-duel-at-half-distance/10320734/
Gelael has brought the #31 LM P2 car into the pits for fresh rubber and a fresh driver: Rene Rast. Well, fresh might be an overstatement, especially for the German, who took the first stint yesterday and was memorably in the thick of the action at the very first turn...
By: autosport.com
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