Peugeot claim 1-2-3 on the grid

Stephane Sarrazin's 3:18.513 lap from Wednesday proved good enough to secure pole position for the No.8 car. Franck Montagny and Nicolas Minassian set the quickest times in the No.9 and No.7 cars respectively.

"I don't know how fast this car can go, but that lap was very close to the limit," said Sarrazin. "It was not easy, when you are pushing like that you have to be precise and I did a very good lap without any mistakes.

"But the car felt amazing and it has a really good balance so I'm very confident for the race. I hope that we can still be faster than the three Audis."

Peugeot's six second advantage over Audi remained as nobody was able to better Allan McNish's 3:23.847 from earlier this evening.

The No.3 Audi of Mike Rockenfeller, Alex Premat and Lucas Luhr will start the race fifth, ahead of the Lola Aston Martin, which managed to break into the top six.

Stefan Mucke set a string of exceptional laps early in the final qualifying session and knocked the No.1 Audi down to seventh.

Frank Biela and Marco Werner pulled out all the stops to regain the place for the No.1 car right at the end of qualifying. Both set laps quicker than any other for the car throughout the two days, but Werner missed out on sixth spot by just a tenth of a second.

The factory Dome also took seconds off its best time and Daisuke Ito earned the Japanese manufacturer eighth place on the grid with a 3:26.928. The car ground to a halt later in the session with Yuji Tachikawa at the wheel and had to be pushed back to the pits from the Porsche Curves.

The No.17 Pescarolo will start ninth. Emmanuel Collard/Jean-Cristophe Boullion/Romain Dumas led the petrol runners for much of qualifying, despite losing running when Dumas crashed on Wednesday evening, but they were demoted by the Lola Aston and the Dome in the final session.

The No.21 Epsilon Euskadi was relieved to be granted more dry running after its troubles yesterday and Jean-Marc Gounon lifted the car to 15th overall with a best time over a second quicker than the sister Epsilon.

The four-minute barrier was smashed, as predicted, in the GT2 class. Wolf Henzler, in the No.77 Felbermayr Porsche, posted a 3:59.072 before Patrick Long set a stunning 3:58.152 in the IMSA Porsche.

But Rob Bell proved that Ferrari too could manage a sub four-minute lap and produced a 3:59.820 in the No.96 Virgo 430.

Things closed up in GT1 as well, with Christophe Bouchut in the Larbre Competition Saleen splitting the factory Corvettes at the head of the class, less than one tenth of a second behind the No.63 Chevrolet.

But Bouchut couldn't stop O'Connell/Magnussen/Fellows taking Chevrolet's first pole position at Le Mans.

"It's been a great day for us," said Magnussen. "We thought we were fast yesterday and we improved another chunk today. It's my first pole here as well as Corvette's."

Aston Martin increased their pace in the final session, too, with Antonio Garcia and Heinz-Harald Frentzen improving the best efforts of the No.009 and No.007 cars respectively. They remained behind the two Corvettes and the Saleen, but just 2.2 seconds covered all five cars.

The Porsche RS Spyders dominated in LMP2 with the Van Merksteijn and Team Essex cars leading the way, but both the Barazi Epsilon and the Team Sebah Lola are within a couple of seconds of their pace.

With most cars electing not to go out on track for the last 45 minutes of the final session, it left the road almost clear for Audi and Peugeot to demonstrate their respectively abilities in the dark.

Sarrazin and Pedro Lamy set the initial pace, lapping consistently around the 3:24 mark, but the Audis were able to respond much better than on Wednesday. McNish and Tom Kristensen posted times in the 3:25s, while Biela and Luhr circulated in the 3:26s, raising hopes of a close battle in race conditions.

But Peugeot pressed on further at the end of the session. The No.7 car was initially in the 3:23s in the hands of Marc Gene, before Nicolas Minassian unleashed a string of incredible 3:22 and 3:21 laps right at the end of the session to hammer home the French manufacturer's superiority.