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WEC 24 Hours of Le Mans

Le Mans 24 Hours final qualifying day

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As the Toyota crew does its best impersonation of the 'Vettel Finger' pose, we're going to wind down our Live coverage for the evening and begin chasing post-session reaction from the different class winners.

Make sure to keep an eye on Autosport.com tomorrow for the latest from the ACO press conference and more pre-race build-up from Team Autosport, and join us again on Saturday for the big one, where we may or may not give more snippets of Roberto Gonzalez' career history.

Thanks very much for joining us, and we'll see you soon.
Duval's final lap is not good enough, so Graff end the session on top of the LMP2 standings thanks to Tristan Gommendy, who takes his second career pole at Le Mans after topping the times in 2013.
Chequered flag is out - the #7 Toyota beats the sister #8 car to pole for the 2019 Le Mans 24 Hours.
Lapierre's roll of the dice is unsuccessful and he stays third, despite going purple in sector one and two - clearly he must have caught traffic in the final sector. Duval is still out on track, but doesn't appear t be lighting up the timing screens.
Dirk Muller moves up the #68 Ford GT to sixth in GTE Pro with just five minutes left on the clock, but it's still five different manufacturers in the top five as things stand (that's Aston, Ford, Corvette, Porsche and BMW).
And as we type, Nicolas Lapierre goes purple in sector two to move up to fourth in the #36 Signatech-Alpine - albeit eight tenths off Gommendy's best. Could he spoil the party for his compatriot in the dying moments?
The Graf Racing ORECA is in the pits so won't be defending its provisional LMP2 pole in the closing stages of the session. But there are some heavy hitters out on track, with Loic Duval aboard the second-placed #28 TDS Racing ORECA and Anthony Davidson in the third-placed #31 DragonSpeed ORECA.
We now have a new third-place driver in GTE Am, as Austrian youngster Thomas Preining puts the #86 Gulf Racing Porsche up behind the two Dempsey-Proton Competition cars.
Here's how they stack up in GTE Pro heading into the final 15 minutes: 1. Aston Martin #97, 2. Ford #67, 3. Corvette #63, 4. Porsche #93, 5. BMW #82, 6. Porsche #92, 7. Ferrari #81, 8. Ford #66, 9. Ford #69, 10. Ferrari #51.
Some real movement in GTE Pro. Garcia has moved the #63 Corvette up to third with a late effort of 3m48.830s - 0.830s slower than Sorensen's pleasingly round class benchmark of 3m48.000s.
A reminder of the LMP1 order with 20-odd minutes to go: 1 #7 Toyota; 2 #8 Toyota; 3 #17 SMP; 4 #3 Rebellion; 5 #11 SMP; 6 #1 Rebellion; 7 #10 DragonSpeed; 8 #4 ByKolles.
And you can read the fruits of that conversation in tomorrow's 'Things We Learned' feature, so look out for that for plenty of nuggets from our on-site correspondents.
No improvements at the top in LMP2, but interestingly it's a top five sweep for ORECA, with the best-placed Ligier down in sixth courtesy of birthday boy Filipe Albuquerque. JAMES NEWBOLD tried his best to ruin his birthday earlier by getting him to talk about tyres for 10 minutes, but the Portuguese was unflappable.
Lopez has also stepped in for Kobayashi in the leading #7 TS050 HYBRID.
Alonso brings the #8 Toyota into the pits and hands over to Buemi - who, presumably, will see this through to the finish. 28 and a half minutes left on the clock now.
Want an idea of what got JAMES NEWBOLD excited trackside earlier? Turn your sound up for the next post...
Berthon spoils that LMP1 observation by bringing the #3 back to the pits, and both SMP cars are come in as well now.
All seven LMP1s that aren't consigned to the garage are now on track. The provisional polesitting #7 was fastest on the most recent round of laps, with Kobayashi recording a 3m20.730s.
Jokes aside, Capillaire has been a regular in LMP2 since 2014, and that year won an ELMS race for Sebastien Loeb Racing alongside Jimmy Eriksson - elder brother of BMW DTM driver Joel - at Estoril.
Jarvis is on the move again, finding another seven tenths in the Risi Ferrari. That still leaves him 17th in Pro, but it means the #89 car only trails one Am car now, the #88 Dempsey-Proton Porsche.
We're aware LMP1 updates are becoming more sporadic, but that's because less is happening in general. Menezes did pump in another fastest first sector of all on his previous lap, though ultimately failed to improve, while the #1 car has now returned to the pits after its stoppage.
Currently at the wheel of the pole-sitting LMP2 #39 Graff ORECA is Vincent Capillaire. You might remember him as the orange-clad driver Kamui Kobayashi mistook for a marshal when Capillaire ran over to give him the thumbs up during the 2017 race.
Hold onto your hats, it's another GTE Pro improvement. This time the man responsible is Ryan Briscoe in the #69 Ford GT with a time good enough for ninth in class.
That might be the briefest slow zone of the weekend so far - the track is now clear again at the end of sector two.
Our first improvement in GTE Pro for a little while has just popped up, but don't get too excited. It's just the Risi Ferrari of Oliver Jarvis improving to a 3m52.162s, which keeps that car 17th and last, albeit ahead of a few more Am class cars now.
Menezes moves the #3 Rebellion up to fourth with a 3m16.404s, which is nine tenths away from the leading #7 Toyota's time.
As quickly as that, we've got a slow zone coming into force at marshal post 20 - that's at Mulsanne corner.
We do have something to report in the early stages after the restart - Menezes has just pumped in the fastest first sector of all, and sets a personal best in the middle sector.
No massive rush from the LMP1s to return to the circuit. Both Toyotas are on track again, as is the remaining Rebellion and the ByKolles.
We're not saying that a red flag period is boring, but our very own GARY WATKINS has just done the 'Flossing' dance move.

By: Geoff Creighton

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