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WEC 24 Hours of Le Mans

Le Mans 24 Hours 2015 Wednesday: Practice and qualifying

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GARY WATKINS: There were four fewer corners on the Circuit de la Sarthe when Stuckie set that record. So that's no Dunlop Chicane, no chicanes on the Mulsanne and no corner between the Dunlop Bridge and the Esses proper.
Buemi and Wurz have moved the Toyotas ahead of Tandy's #19 Porsche, so they are back in 5th and 6th again.
Duval and Bonanomi bring in the #8 and #9 Audis respectively. Di Grassi and Albuquerque take over.
Tandy has got back ahead of the Toyotas in what's becoming a private battle for fifth.

Current order:

1 #18 Porsche
2 #17 Porsche
3 #8 Audi
4 #9 Audi
5 #19 Porsche
6 #1 Toyota
And already that leaderboard is out of date. Fassler moves the #7 Audi into 6th, ahead of both Toyotas.
Mucke goes fourth in GTE (and third in GTE Pro) aboard the #97 Aston Martin, a fraction shy of Bruni and about the same amount faster than Calado.

Lamy's effort means AMR is on top of both GTE classes at the moment.
GARY WATKINS: Porsche is swapping drivers, but there might be another pole shot from the boys from Stuttgart later on. It is understood that another driver in each of the cars could get to go for a time right at the end of the session.

Obviously it is going to be dark, but cooler temperatures and perhaps a quieter circuit could outweigh that disadvantage. Who remembers a couple of last-gasp poles for Tomas Enge in GT1 with Ferrari and then Aston Martin?
Tandy exits the battle with the Toyotas and makes it a Porsche 1-2-3 at the front, slotting in two seconds behind the other two 919s.
Calado and Makowiecki gets warnings for track limits at Tertre Rouge. That's a hotspot for that offence at the moment.
Driver change at KCMG, Lapierre is getting a shot at these conditions. Only the Murphy Prototypes entry, which is still being repaired, that's yet to set a time in LMP2.
GARY WATKINS: The drivers are cycling through the cars. Remember each has to do five laps in the dark to qualify for the race and with rain forecast tomorrow, the teams will want to tick that box tonight.
Mardenborough is 16th overall in the only Nissan we've seen set a time. The #22 car appeared for a lap, while the #21 remains in the garage at this stage.
The #21 Nissan is wheeled out into the pitlane for its first appearance in this qualifying session.
Gommendy moves up to P4 in the Thiriet by TDS Racing ORECA, as replays show Fogarty in Extreme Speed Motorsports' Ligier skipping the penultimate chicane.
Calado's been reported to the stewards now for Tertre Rouge track-limits violations. The #71 Ferrari's fifth-place overall in GTE could be under threat.
Make that the #71's fourth place – Calado improves to a 3m55.701s, which might well be dismissed because he's overrun the exit of Tertre Rouge.
Gaps between the leading cars from each LMP1 manufacturer:

Porsche (fastest)
Audi +2.9s
Toyota +7.4s
Rebellion +14.3s
Nissan +24.5s
CLM +28.9s
Given the relative lack of pace of the Toyotas, there seems little chance of the most successful qualifier in the 2015 field having a shot at another pole position.

Stephane Sarrazin has three Le Mans pole positions to his name, all achieved for Peugeot from 2007-2009.
Free practice pacesetter Webber is ready to go in the Porsche garage, so it would appear that Hartley will be in soon to hand over the #17 919.
Here are the last 10 pole position winners at Le Mans:

2014 Kazuki Nakajima (Toyota TS040 Hybrid) 3m21.780s
2013 Loic Duval (Audi R18 e-tron quattro), 3m22.346s
2012 Andre Lotterer (Audi R18 e-tron quattro), 3m23.787s
2011 Benoit Treluyer (Audi R18 TDI), 3m21.789s
2010 Sebastien Bourdais (Peugeot 908 HDI FAP), 3m19.711s
2009 Stephane Sarrazin (Peugeot 908 HDI FAP), 3m22.888s
2008 Stephane Sarrazin (Peugeot 908 HDI FAP), 3m18.513s
2007 Stephane Sarrazin (Peugeot 908 HDI FAP), 3m26.344s
2006 Rinaldo Capello (Audi R10 TDI), 3m30.466s
2005 Emmanuel Collard (Pescarolo-Judd C60), 3m23.715s
The #21 Nissan is still out in the pitlane, but work seems to be focused inside the cockpit for the moment. The #22 car has posted a time with Krumm at the wheel, putting it 26th overall.
The #36 Signatech will lose its first five laps for abuse of the track limits. The car has done eight laps and is currently sixth in LMP2, with Panciatici behind the wheel.
A warning for the #91 Porsche now for track limits at...

Tertre Rouge.
Kaffer moves the ByKolles CLM up to 15th overall, 23 seconds off the pace of the Porsches.
Evans improves to a 3m39.679s for Jota Sport, he's up to third.
Bruni reported to the stewards – that's both the Ferraris potentially in hot water.

Meanwhile, Antonio Garcia puts the #63 Corvette fifth overall and fourth in GTE Pro.
Remember that all four of the factory LMP1 teams are running in different hybrid subclasses:

Nissan: 2MJ
Audi: 4MJ
Toyota: 6MJ
Porsche: 8MJ
Confirmation that Calado loses laps one to six, they've been deleted for abuse of track limits at Tertre Rouge. The #71 Ferrari drops to last, with no time. Rigon's now aboard the 458 Italia.

Tertre Rouge is close to no longer looking like a real corner name, it's been written so much in the last few minutes...
Double yellow flags in sector six, the #37 SMP Racing is off. Kirill Ladygin is in the gravel, having lost the BR01 coming onto Mulsanne, he was lucky not to hit anything and damage the car in a major way.
Mardenborough sets the fastest Nissan lap so far: 3m38.468s moves the #23 car up to P12 overall, +21.5s off the pace.

And, for now, that's 0.4s slower than the #47 KCMG car that's leading the way in LMP2.
More Nissan news - the #21 car is finally out on track.
The beached SMP Racing #37 is being cleared from the gravel trap and onto the back of a truck for the journey back to the pits. That part of the track is now clear again.
Lotterer gets our hopes up with two personal best sectors in the #7 Audi, but he abandons the lap so the car stays 6th.

Another car returning to the pits is the #21 Nissan, which came back before setting a time.
All change in the GTE Pro ranks as we pass the 45-minute mark.

1. #99 Aston – MacDowall in for Stanaway
2. #98 Aston – Lauda in for Lamy*
3. #51 Ferrari - Fisichella in for Bruni
4. #63 Corvette – Magnussen in for Garcia
5. #97 Aston - Turner in for Mucke

* GTE Am provisional pole
Our position in the media centre is above the AF Corse GT Ferraris and LMP2's Krohn Racing. Here's a shot of the latter, United SportsCar Championship leader Barbosa is currently in its Ligier-Judd/BMW JSP2.

Matsuda heads back out in the #21 Nissan - maybe we'll get a time from the car with this run. In the #23 that's flying the Nissan flag closer to the sharp end, Pla has taken over from Mardenborough.
The #99 Aston, now in the hands of MacDowall, is the latest to get flagged up for track limits at Tertre Rouge.

By: Glenn Freeman, Edd Straw, Scott Mitchell, Mitchell Adam, AUTOSPORT staff, Gary Watkins

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