Le Mans 24 Hours: Porsche GTE gap erased, #7 Toyota leads overall
A safety car erased Porsche's lead in GTE Am, while the #7 Toyota moved back ahead of the sister #8 TS050 HYBRID as the Le Mans 24 Hours passed halfway
Mike Conway had been marginally behind Sebastien Buemi at the turn of the previous hour, but ended his second stint in the car with an advantage of 1m02.781s over Buemi - who had stopped the #8 two laps earlier and did not hand over to a team-mate.
That proved enough for the #7 to get the jump on the #8 as Kamui Kobayashi emerged from the pitlane.
The two cars were in the same queue when a safety-car period was called late on, and restarted less than two seconds apart, but Kobayashi blitzed the restart in traffic to pull an initial gap of eight seconds.
Nathanael Berthon remains third in the #3 Rebellion-Gibson R-13, and had a further level of comfortability added to his margin over the sole remaining SMP car of Stoffel Vandoorne during the safety-car period.
World Touring Car Cup race winner Berthon now has 2m30s in hand over the #11 BR Engineering BR1, which in turn is three laps ahead of the #1 Rebellion - the last of the LMP1 cars in a representative position in the overall order.
The ByKolles car is still circulating in the hands of Tom Dillmann, but is 55th in the order and 39 laps down.
LMP2 - G-Drive hold two minute advantage
Roman Rusinov has retained G-Drive Racing's two-minute advantage over the #36 Signatech-Alpine now being driven by Andre Negrao at the race's halfway stage.
After taking over from Pierre Thiriet, Negrao was unable to make inroads into Rusinov's lead due to two incidents involving Henning Enqvist in the ARC Bratislava Ligier, which had been multiple laps down after several scrapes throughout the race.
Swedish gentleman driver Enqvist first locked up at Indianapolis and nosed into the wall, requiring the car to be craned out of the gravel.
He then hit the wall at the Porsche Curves and was unable to get the car back to the pits.
Behind Negrao, Signatech's chief title rivals for the WEC LMP2 championship continue to hold third place with Ho-Pin Tung taking over from Gabriel Aubry in the #38 Jackie Chan DC Racing ORECA.
Pastor Maldonado was attempting to chase him down in fourth for DragonSpeed, but Tung was comfortably maintaining the gap at around six seconds at the hour mark.
Matthieu Vaviviere has brought the #28 TDS Racing ORECA back to fifth, usurping the #37 DC Racing ORECA of Ricky Taylor.
Vaxiviere and team-mate Loic Duval have been running back-to-back stints throughout the night to give their gentleman co-driver Francois Perrodo a chance to rest, while the Jota Sport-run #37 crew gave its amateur driver David Heinemeier-Hansson a triple stint.
GTE - Safety car erases Porsche lead as Ferrari closes in
Laurens Vanthoor appeared to have broken into a comfortable GTE Pro lead in the 12th hour, only for the safety car to bring the #51 Ferrari back into play.
Porsche driver Vanthoor returned to the track with an advantage of more than half a minute over AF Corse's Daniel Serra, but the subsequent slow period wiped that out and meant the two restarted just a handful of seconds apart.
The #91 Porsche is now up to third in class in Fred Makowiecki's hands, with Earl Bamber making it three 911 RSRs in the top four.
Bamber was within a second of the #91 car, and had a 2.7s margin over the sole remaining Corvette of Mike Rockenfeller.
Felipe Fraga continues to lead the Am class in the Keating Ford, while Charlie Eastwood claimed second in his TF Sport Aston Martin by passing the #77 Porsche of Christian Reid after the safety car period.
Positions after 12 hours
Pos | Class | Car | Drivers | Laps | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | LMP1 | #7 Toyota | Conway, Kobayashi, Lopez | 187 | |
2 | LMP1 | #8 Toyota | Buemi, Nakajima, Alonso | 187 | + 4.508s |
3 | LMP1 | #3 Rebellion | Laurent, Berthon, Menezes | 185 | + 2 Laps |
4 | LMP1 | #11 BR | Petrov, Aleshin, Vandoorne | 184 | + 3 Laps |
5 | LMP1 | #1 Rebellion | Jani, Lotterer, Senna | 181 | + 6 Laps |
6 | LMP2 | #26 Aurus | Rusinov, Van Uitert, Vergne | 179 | + 8 Laps |
7 | LMP2 | #36 Alpine | Lapierre, Negrao, Thiriet | 179 | + 3m08.454s |
8 | LMP2 | #38 Oreca | Tung, Richelmi, Aubry | 178 | + 9 Laps |
9 | LMP2 | #31 Oreca | Gonzalez, Maldonado, Davidson | 178 | + 10.168s |
10 | LMP2 | #28 Oreca | Perrodo, Vaxiviere, Duval | 178 | + 3m12.044s |
11 | LMP2 | #37 Oreca | Heinemeier-Hansson, King, Taylor | 178 | + 3m15.902s |
12 | LMP2 | #22 Ligier | Hanson, Albuquerque, Di Resta | 177 | + 10 Laps |
13 | LMP2 | #32 Ligier | Cullen, Brundle, Owen | 177 | + 0.417s |
14 | LMP2 | #48 Oreca | Lafargue, Chatin, Rojas | 176 | + 11 Laps |
15 | LMP2 | #30 Oreca | Jamin, Ragues, Dumas | 176 | + 10.911s |
16 | LMP2 | #23 Ligier | Binder, Canal, Stevens | 176 | + 3m26.244s |
17 | LMP2 | #25 Oreca | Zollinger, Pizzitola, Falb | 175 | + 12 Laps |
18 | LMP2 | #39 Oreca | Gommendy, Capillaire, Hirschi | 174 | + 13 Laps |
19 | LMP2 | #47 Dallara | Lacorte, Sernagiotto, Belicchi | 174 | + 3m15.129s |
20 | LMP2 | #43 Oreca | Farano, Maini, Nato | 173 | + 14 Laps |
21 | LMP2 | #50 Ligier | Creed, Ricci, Boulle | 172 | + 15 Laps |
22 | LMP2 | #20 Oreca | Fjordbach, Andersen, Beche | 171 | + 16 Laps |
23 | LMP2 | #29 Dallara | Van Eerd, Van Der Garde, De Vries | 171 | + 45.290s |
24 | LMP2 | #34 Ligier | Smiechowski, Winslow, Moore | 167 | + 20 Laps |
25 | GTE Pro | #92 Porsche | Christensen, Estre, Vanthoor | 167 | + 3m03.407s |
26 | GTE Pro | #51 Ferrari | Pier Guidi, Calado, Serra | 167 | + 3m05.645s |
27 | GTE Pro | #91 Porsche | Lietz, Bruni, Makowiecki | 166 | + 21 Laps |
28 | GTE Pro | #93 Porsche | Pilet, Bamber, Tandy | 166 | + 0.838s |
29 | GTE Pro | #63 Chevrolet | Magnussen, Garcia, Rockenfeller | 166 | + 2.764s |
30 | GTE Pro | #69 Ford | Briscoe, Westbrook, Dixon | 166 | + 5.532s |
31 | GTE Pro | #68 Ford | Hand, Muller, Bourdais | 166 | + 6.746s |
32 | GTE Pro | #67 Ford | Priaulx, Tincknell, Bomarito | 166 | + 12.198s |
33 | GTE Pro | #94 Porsche | Muller, Jaminet, Olsen | 166 | + 3m31.130s |
34 | GTE Pro | #66 Ford | Mucke, Pla, Johnson | 165 | + 22 Laps |
35 | GTE Pro | #89 Ferrari | Derani, Jarvis, Gounon | 165 | + 7.869s |
36 | GTE Pro | #82 BMW | Farfus, Da Costa, Krohn | 164 | + 23 Laps |
37 | LMP1 | #17 BR | Sarrazin, Orudzhev, Sirotkin | 163 | + 24 Laps |
38 | GTE Am | #85 Ford | Keating, Bleekemolen, Fraga | 163 | + 1h37m10.637s |
39 | GTE Am | #77 Porsche | Campbell, Ried, Andlauer | 163 | + 1h40m30.889s |
40 | GTE Am | #90 Aston | Yoluc, Hankey, Eastwood | 163 | + 1h40m31.287s |
41 | GTE Am | #84 Ferrari | Segal, Baptista, Lu | 162 | + 25 Laps |
42 | GTE Am | #62 Ferrari | Macneil, Vilander, Smith | 162 | + 3.368s |
43 | GTE Am | #56 Porsche | Bergmeister, Lindsey, Perfetti | 162 | + 5.460s |
44 | GTE Am | #61 Ferrari | Perez-Companc, Griffin, Cressoni | 162 | + 3m35.568s |
45 | GTE Pro | #81 BMW | Catsburg, Tomczyk, Eng | 161 | + 26 Laps |
46 | GTE Am | #57 Ferrari | Kimura, Cozzolino, Ledogar | 161 | + 4.599s |
47 | GTE Am | #86 Porsche | Wainwright, Barker, Preining | 161 | + 2m10.386s |
48 | GTE Am | #78 Porsche | Prette, Prette, Abril | 161 | + 3m24.739s |
49 | GTE Am | #70 Ferrari | Ishikawa, Beretta, Cheever | 160 | + 27 Laps |
50 | GTE Am | #54 Ferrari | Flohr, Castellacci, Fisichella | 160 | + 0.429s |
51 | GTE Am | #83 Ferrari | Gostner, Frey, Gatting | 160 | + 1m03.558s |
52 | LMP2 | #49 Ligier | Konopka, Enqvist, Tereschenko | 158 | + 29 Laps |
53 | GTE Pro | #97 Aston | Martin, Lynn, Adam | 158 | + 27m34.280s |
54 | GTE Am | #60 Ferrari | Schiavoni, Pianezzola, Piccini | 157 | + 30 Laps |
55 | LMP1 | #4 Enso | Dillmann, Webb, Ruberti | 148 | + 39 Laps |
56 | GTE Pro | #71 Ferrari | Rigon, Bird, Molina | 140 | + 47 Laps |
57 | GTE Pro | #95 Aston | Thiim, Sorensen, Turner | 132 | + 55 Laps |
58 | GTE Am | #98 Aston | Dalla Lana, Lamy, Lauda | 87 | + 100 Laps |
59 | GTE Am | #88 Porsche | Hoshino, Roda Jr, Cairoli | 79 | + 108 Laps |
60 | LMP1 | #10 BR | Hedman, Hanley, Van Der Zande | 76 | + 111 Laps |
61 | GTE Pro | #64 Chevrolet | Gavin, Milner, Fassler | 82 | + 105 Laps |
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