Le Mans 24 Hours H17: Buemi keeps #8 in control, #7 closes back in

Sebastien Buemi continued to extend his advantage over Kamui Kobayashi at the beginning of the hour and then eked out further breathing space for the #8 Toyota TS050 HYBRID as the clock ticked towards 8am.

But the Swiss driver, who shares #8 with Fernando Alonso and Kazuki Nakajima, was caught one more time in a short-lived slow zone as the hour came to a close.

That cost his 12 or so seconds of an advantage that had stood at 45s. The difference between the two Toyotas at the top of the hour was a shade over 32s, with Mike Conway now in the #7.

Both Toyotas we handed one-minute stop-go penalties for speeding in an 80km/h slow zone over the course of hour 15.

The two Rebellion-Gibson R-13s held third and fouth positions, with Andre Lotterer edging towards team-mate Thomas Laurent.

G-Drive still in command in LMP2

There was no change among the leading runners in LMP2, with Roman Rusinov still a lap clear of the chasing pack in the #26 G-Drive ORECA 07-Gibson.

Timothe Buret replaced Julien Canal in the second-placed Panis Barthez Ligier, and is currently 1m40s up the road from the #36 Signatech Alpine of Nicolas Lapierre, who occupies third.

The polesitting IDEC Sport ORECA is just about on the same lap as the Alpine in the hands of Memo Rojas.

Matthieu Vaxiviere spun at the Dunlop chicane towards the end of the hour and got stuck in the gravel, but is circulating once more after returning to the pits.

Porsche pair holds GTE 1-2

Porsche's pair of retro-coloured 911 RSRs continued their domination of the GTE Pro contest.

Kevin Estre stayed at the wheel of the lead 'Pink Pig' #92, and ended the 17th hour with an increased advantage of 2m36s over team-mate Richard Lietz's #91 entry.

The best of the Ganassi-run Fords continued to hold third with Joey Hand at the wheel, 33s down on the #91 Porsche.

IndyCar ace Scott Dixon's Ford was locked in battle with Audi DTM driver Mike Rockenfeller's Corvette for fourth, with Dixon two seconds clear at the top of the hour.

The lead Ferrari, the #52 488 GTE Evo piloted by Sauber F1 reserve Antonio Giovinazzi, slipped to seventh in class after a two-minute pitstop.

BMW hit more issues with its sole remaining M8, with the #81 dropping to last of the runners in class after a 20-minute trip to the garage to replace a radiator.

Matt Campbell stretched the #77 Dempsey-Proton's advantage to more than three minutes in the GTE Am class, with the two lead Ferraris - the #85 Keating/Risi car and the #54 Spirit of Race entry - split by 16s in the fight for second.

Positions after 17 hours