Le Mans 24 Hours Live Commentary and Updates
Minute-by-minute updates for the 2024 Le Mans 24 Hours.
Live Text
I have inherited a bunch of LMP2 pitstops at the changing of the guard! With driver changes into the bargain...Ritomo Miyata has taken over from Jakobsen in the Cool Racing car while Patrick Pilet remains aboard the Vector Sport machine.
That was Calado coming in to switch to softs, as well as the #2 Cadillac of Bamber. The #51 shortcuts the chicane on cold tyres after coming out behind the #12 Jota.
Hello! Not a bad time to start my first stint as the Ferrari #51 takes a trip through the gravel entering the pits. Start as we mean to go on!
We're nine hours in, and there are still 15 to go. On that note, time for our next Live handover as Ewan Gale and Richard Asher take over the controls. Go well gentlemen.
Now in from the LMGT3 lead comes Bachler, with Olsen following him in from second. Lietz, who has overtaken Jordan Taylor, now cycles back to the front in the #91 Porsche ahead of Taylor's #155 Ferrari that had never really featured towards the front until the safety car when the Acura GTP ace climbed aboard for the first time.
Lead change in LMP2 - Scherer has overtaken Jakobsen, while Deletraz and Catsburg have each rotated their mounts.
The #93 Peugeot spun at the exit of the Dunlop chicane, at the hands of Nico Muller. No damage to report, and the Swiss driver is on his way.
Oh dear, there's another drive-through penalty for the #23 United Autosports ORECA for a slow zone infringement. Also pinged are the #4 PPM Porsche of Felipe Nasr, 17th in Hypercar, and the Jota Porsche of Will Stevens that is currently tenth.
Ian James has handed over the HoR Aston to Alex Riberas, which is significant in the grand scheme of things in the GT3 battle. He's just 10 minutes short of completing his six-hour minimum drive-time, having driven throughout the safety car. Once that 10 minutes are complete, Riberas and Daniel Mancinelli can go through to the end.
About Laurens Vanthoor, the gap between his #6 Porsche and Ryo Hirakawa's leading #8 Toyota has been stable lately, around 15 seconds.
An amusing snippet of information after nearly nine hours of racing: only four drivers have managed a sub-3m29.6s lap time so far... and two of them are the Vanthoor brothers, Dries racing for BMW and Laurens for Porsche. The other two are Toyota's Brendon Hartley and Ferrari's Antonio Fuoco, so four constructors are represented.
Now that Lietz has switched to wets, he's closed right in on Jordan Taylor's Spirit of Race Ferrari that currently holds third in LMGT3. Their battle is 1m04s behind the leading #92 Manthey Rxcing Porsche currently driven by Klaus Bachler, who has Dennis Olsen chasing hard behind in the #88 Proton Ford.
Deletraz has pitted the AO by TF LMP2 car and remained on-board, which lifts Pilet back to fourth. Up ahead, the top three in class are split by just 2.6s with Jakobsen just fending off Scherer and Barnicoat. We've a right ding-dong battle in prospect, but we're not able to see it on the telly right now.
A slow zone is in force to clear the #46 car Al Harthy shares with Martin and Rossi.
That was a very strange-looking off. The bronze-rated driver in the car that led earlier on in Valentino Rossi's hands ran wide at the Dunlop Chicane, then as he came back onto the road and accelerated down the hill, the car snapped suddenly left and Al Harthy was a passenger, clouting the barriers.
Vanthoor has been catching up with Hirakawa in the lead, the #6 Porsche is now under 20 seconds off the Toyota's first position.
Drama for Al Harthy! The #46 WRT BMW is off the road.
Pipo Derani pits abord the #311 Cadillac. He has already driven for more than four hours in this race.
The temperature is down to 13°C. Showers are now forecast until 10am, after which the remainder of the race should be dry.
The stop-and-go penalty has left the #83 Ferrari in sixth, 54 seconds off the lead Toyota.
It's all change at the head of the leaderboard in LMGT3. As predicted, Lietz couldn't hold on, but it's now Bachler who leads from Olsen, the duo making their wet tyres pay. Gatting has seen enough and come in for the grooved rubber.
Scherer hasn't been able to dislodge Jakobsen from the LMP2 lead, and their battle looks set to be joined soon enough by Barnicoat who has closed to within 6s. Jarvis meanwhile has returned to the cockpit of the #22 United car, having taken over from Garg at the last stop, and moved ahead of Pilet into fifth spot.
Mako in the #5 Porsche is now more than a minute off the lead and still pounding around on slicks. Why? Answers on a postcard please!
There is now a slow zone in force on the Mulsanne straight to clear the stricken Duqueine car.
Kubica pits to serve his penalty, Hirakawa inherits the lead of the Le Mans 24 Hours.
How things can change in the space of a few laps - Olsen and Bachler are comfortably the fastest GT3 cars on track at the moment after taking wets at the restart and are lapping 20s per lap quicker than Gatting. Inevitably they pass the Iron Dames Lambo into second and third, with Leitz's lead now seemingly precarious.
While Porsche's Makowiecki is down to ninth, the gap between leader Kubica (#83 Ferrari) and chaser Hirakawa (#8 Toyota) is just three seconds now.
Game over for the Duqueine LMP2. It has conked out in rather abrupt fashion with smoke pouring from the air vent on the approach to the first Mulsanne Chicane.
The latest round of drive-through penalties for safety car procedural infringements affects the Panis LMP2 car of Mathias Beche, the much-delayed #23 United car of Ben Hanley, and perhaps more significantly the #78 Lexus that Timur Boguslavskiy has just handed over to Kelvin van der Linde.
Makowiecki drops down to seventh behind the #7 Toyota, the #50 Ferrari and the #2 Cadillac.
While Lietz is quickly pulling away from Gatting in GT3, we have a race on our hands in LMP2 as Jakobsen is less than a second ahead of Scherer. The duo has pulled 7s on Barnicoat in third, while Deletraz is 19s back in fourth having got past Pilet.
Makowiecki has now been overtaken by the sister #6 Porsche car, driven by Laurens Vanthoor.
After a few glorious laps in the lead, Hawksworth is in and followed to the pits by Marino Sato. Lietz is now at the head of the LMGT3 pack, having passed Gatting's Lambo.
The #83 Ferrari is given a 30-second stop-and-go penalty for its collision with the #15 BMW! This will drop it off the top five.
Mako lost 35s that lap. Reckon he's going to have to abort his run on slicks. Not sure there there is anything to gain by staying out.
Hirakawa takes second position. For now, the slick tyre gamble is not paying off for Makowiecki. He lost 39 seconds to the Toyota on the latest lap.
Sturm's unplanned visit to the gravel on his way into the pits cost plenty of time. Bachler is now 11th and nine seconds behind Dennis Olsen's #88 Ford.
The #83 Ferrari is back into the lead with Kubica at the wheel! The Pole easily overtook struggling Makowiecki, with the Porsche driver coming under pressure from Toyota's Hirakawa.
In the LMGT3 race, Jack Hawksworth has cycled to the lead in the #87 ASP Lexus. Michelle Gatting is now second in the Iron Dames Lambo, with Richard Lietz third in the #91 Manthey EMA Porsche. James Cottingham is still going in the #95 United Autosports McLaren, with Timur Boguslavskiy fifth in the #78 Lexus and Ahmad Al Harthy's #46 BMW sixth.
By: Autosport Staff
