Hour 2: Biela and Audi take over lead

Frank Biela has moved into the lead of the 69th Le Man 24 Hours as the race goes past the two hours mark. The factory Audi driver spent the majority of the second hour fighting with Martin Brundle's Bentley and the surprising Panoz of Klaus Graf.
As the second 60 minutes began, Brundle pitted from the lead having selected to run intermediates, but Graf was already on slicks. It quickly became clear that the green car was on the wrong tyres and despite running as much as eight seconds off the fastest pace, Brundle has not yet pitted again.

While these two diced, Biela set about chasing them both down and was swiftly into the lead, which he only briefly lost during his pitstop.

The rain has stayed away during the second hour, but clouds are hanging ominously low. At the moment Biela leads from Brundle with the second Audi of Laurent Aiello now up to third after a disastrous first hour. Ralf Kelleners is now fourth ahead of the Chryslers of Beretta and Dalmas.

MG did run as high as third, Mark Blundell spending most of the hour fastest of all, but dropped to sixteenth after a lengthy pitstop.



The LMP675 lead looked set to be monumentally taken over by the number 33 MG being driven by Mark Blundell after the Brit put in a blistering first stint to move up to third place overall.

After the carnage brought about by the changing weather in the first hour, the cars began to settle into a rhythm and Blundell was one of the fastest men on the circuit. However, brake problems slowed the former Champ Car driver and he came in to the pits to swap driver duties with Julian Bailey, but went over the gravel on the pitlane entry.

"We've got a little bit of a brake problem at the moment," said Blundell. "But this is the longest run the car has ever done, so we're finding things out about it all the time."

The Chamberalin motorsport mechanics had to remove the rear bodywork to get rid of the gravel and the length of the pitstop left Bailey in 14th overall and second in class when he rejoined.

That gave the class lead back to the ROC Competion Reynard, which was leading at the end of the first hour and Didier de Radigues had continued to lap consistently moving the Belgian up to eighth overall.

The GTS class battle hotted up with the Ron Fellows Corvette handing the lead to the Paul Belmondo Racing Viper of Vincent Vosse, Carl Rosenblad Vanina Ickx, while Fellows' sister Corvette C5-R moved up to second. Johnny Mowlem took over in the RML Saleen and managed to stay in touch with the leaders in third and 21st overall.

In the GT class, the pole car of Vic Rice/Shane Lewis/Bob Mazzuoccola, which had started the race from the pitlane, has fought its way back up to take the lead by virtue of the Callaway's larger fuel tank enabling it to complete longer stints.


1 (900) F.Biela/T.Kristensen/E.Pirro, Audi R8, Joest Audi Spor t, 27 laps
7 (GTP) M.Brundle/S.Ortelli/G.Smith, Bentley EXP Speed 8, Team Bentley, +l lap
2 (900) R Capello/L Aiello/C Pescatori, Audi R8, Joest Audi Sport, +1 lap
3 (900) J.Herbert/R.Kelleners/D.Theys, Audi R8, Champion Racing, +1 lap
16 (900) O.Beretta/K.Wendlinger/P.Lamy, Chrysler-Mopar LMP, Team Playstation, +1 lap
15 (900) Y.Dalmas/F.Montagny/S.Sarrazin, Chrysler-Mopar LMP, ORECA Chrysler, +1 lap
8 (GTP) A.Wallace/B.Leitzinger/E.Vande Poele, Bentley EXP Speed 8, Team Bentley, +1 lap
14 (900) S.Ara/N.Amorim/M.Kondo, Chrysler-Mopar LMP, ORECA Chrysler, +1 lap
36 (675) D.de Radigues/S.Maassen/H.Matsuda, Reynard-Judd 01Q, Dick Barbour, +1 lap
17 (900) J C. Boullion/S.Bourdais/L.Redon, Courage-Peugeot C60, Pescarolo Sport, +1 lap


(Class), No, Driver, Car, Team, Time
(900) 2 L Aiello, Audi R8, Team Joest Audi Sport, 3m39.046s


No, Drivers, Car, Team, Time

36 (675) D de Radigues/S Maassen/H Matsuda, Reynard-Judd, ROC Compettion, 2m37.593s, +1 lap

62 (GTS) I.McKellar/B.Lambert/J.Mowlem, Saleen-Ford S7R, Ray Mallock Limited, +2 laps

77 (GT) G.Jeannette/R.Dumas/P.Haezebrouck, Porsche 911 GT3-RS, Freisinger Motorsport, +4 laps


(Class), No, Drivers, Car, Laps, Reason
35 (675) W.Carway/M.O'Connell/F.Migault, Pilbeam-Nissan MP84, Rowan Racing, accident - 5 laps