Le Mans 24 Hours: Porsche leads Toyota after four hours
Brendon Hartley held onto the lead of the Le Mans 24 Hours for Porsche after four hours, running ahead of the Toyota of Stephane Sarrazin
Hartley took the #20 Porsche over from Timo Bernhard, and traded the lead with Sarrazin as they have been pitting out of sequence with each other, and everyone switched back from wet tyres to slicks.
The Porsche did a good job of keeping the Toyota around 20 seconds adrift for much of the most recent stint, but as they approached the four-hour mark Sarrazin started to take chunks of time out of the leading 919.
Benoit Treluyer also made inroads into the leader after being nearly one minute adrift, while Lucas di Grassi remained on the lead lap in the #1 Audi and Nicholas Prost's Rebellion completed the top five.
The #36 Signatech Alpine ORECA leads LMP2 in the hands of Paul-Loup Chatin, although it was about to make its fifth pitstop and lose first place at the turn of the hour.
Michel Frey, in the #34 Race Performance ORECA-Judd/BMW, has the box seat in the class after fighting off Alex Brundle's #35 Ligier in a lead battle, although Frey pitted shortly before the end of the hour.
With Brundle pitting and taking new tyres, the gap between the pair has extended.
The #41 Greaves Motorsport Zytek has officially retired after the crash it suffered with the #48 Murphy Prototypes ORECA, with the latter still being repaired in the pits.
Corvette regained the GTE lead, but the leading contenders from Porsche, Ferrari and Aston Martin are all within a minute of the #74 C7.R.
The Manthey Porsches had begun the hour in formation with Marco Holzer and Jorg Bergmeister first and second, before pitstops for both put the leading Am car of Patrick Long back on top.
Long, whose Dempsey Porsche stayed on slicks when others switched to wets in the previous hour, briefly reclaimed the GTE lead it had previously lost but was out of sync on pitstops and dropped out of the running when Long made way for Patrick Dempsey.
That elevated Bergmeister - who jumped Holzer in the pits - into first place in class, but Tommy Milner also passed the #92 during the stops and quickly hunted the lead 911 RSR down, getting by on the run from Mulsanne corner to Indianapolis.
The Porsches run second and third, with Toni Vilander fourth in the AF Corse Ferrari 458 that started from pole, with Aston Martin's sole Vantage just under half a minute back in fifth.
Aston is faring better in GTE Am, where it holds the lead courtesy of the #95 car of Kristian Poulsen. Dempsey, having taken over from Long, is second in class, just ahead of Archie Hamilton's Ram Ferrari.
POSITIONS AFTER 4 HOURS Pos Cl Car Drivers Laps Gap 1. LMP1 #20 Porsche Bernhard/Webber/Hartley 53 2. LMP1 #7 Toyota Wurz/Sarrazin/Nakajima 53 + 13.357s 3. LMP1 #2 Audi Fassler/Lotterer/Treluyer 53 + 47.520s 4. LMP1 #1 Audi Di Grassi/Gene/Kristensen 53 + 1m38.648s 5. LMP1 #12 Rebellion Prost/Heidfeld/Beche 51 + 2 Laps 6. LMP2 #34 Oreca Frey/Mailleux/Lancaster 49 + 4 Laps 7. LMP2 #36 Alpine Chatin/Panciatici/Webb 49 + 36.292s 8. LMP2 #46 Ligier Thiriet/Badey/Gommendy 49 + 1m17.361s 9. LMP2 #35 Ligier Brundle/Mardenborough/Shulzhitskiy 49 + 1m29.704s 10. LMP2 #43 Morgan Klien/Hirsch/Brandela 49 + 2m53.376s 11. LMP1 #14 Porsche Dumas/Jani/Lieb 49 + 3m13.154s 12. LMP2 #26 Morgan Rusinov/Pla/Canal 48 + 5 Laps 13. LMP2 #24 Oreca Rast/Charouz/Capillaire 48 + 18.907s 14. LMP2 #47 Oreca Howson/Bradley/Imperatori 48 + 33.395s 15. LMP2 #38 Zytek Dolan/Tincknell/Turvey 48 + 54.812s 16. LMP2 #33 Ligier Cheng/Tung/Fong 48 + 2m31.369s 17. GTEP #74 Chevrolet Gavin/Milner/Westbrook 47 + 6 Laps 18. LMP2 #50 Morgan Ragues/Taylor/Ihara 47 + 1.369s 19. GTEP #91 Porsche Pilet/Bergmeister/Tandy 47 + 7.977s 20. GTEP #92 Porsche Holzer/Makowiecki/Lietz 47 + 24.352s 21. GTEP #51 Ferrari Bruni/Vilander/Fisichella 47 + 34.269s 22. LMP2 #29 Morgan Schell/Leutwiller/Roussel 47 + 38.720s 23. GTEP #97 Aston Turner/Mucke/Senna 47 + 49.068s 24. GTEP #73 Chevrolet Magnussen/Garcia/Taylor 47 + 57.480s 25. GTEA #98 Aston Dalla Lana/Lamy/Nygaard 47 + 1m09.197s 26. GTEA #77 Porsche Dempsey/Foster/Long 47 + 2m22.976s 27. LMP2 #42 Zytek Kimber-Smith/McMurry/Dyson 47 + 2m38.135s 28. GTEA #53 Ferrari Mowlem/Patterson/Hamilton 47 + 2m51.742s 29. LMP1 #13 Rebellion Kraihamer/Belicchi/Leimer 47 + 2m59.867s 30. GTEA #72 Ferrari Bertolini/Shaitar/Basov 46 + 7 Laps 31. GTEA #95 Aston Poulsen/Heinemeier-Hansson/Thiim 46 + 12.990s 32. GTEA #88 Porsche Ried/Bachler/Al Qubaisi 46 + 1m28.020s 33. GTEP #52 Ferrari Griffin/Parente/Leo 46 + 2m07.695s 34. GTEA #90 Ferrari Montecalvo/Roda/Ruberti 46 + 2m28.808s 35. GTEA #70 Ferrari Nakano/Ehret/Rich 46 + 2m34.524s 36. GTEA #67 Porsche Maris/Merlin/Helary 46 + 2m40.168s 37. GTEA #61 Ferrari Perez-Companc/Cioci/Venturi 46 + 2m54.856s 38. GTEA #66 Ferrari Al Faisal/Neiman/Pumpelly 46 + 3m24.887s 39. GTEA #57 Ferrari Krohn/Jonsson/Collins 45 + 8 Laps 40. GTEA #75 Porsche Perrodo/Collard/Palttala 45 + 27.496s 41. GTEA #58 Ferrari Barthez/Pons/Ayari 45 + 1m09.767s 42. GTEA #60 Ferrari Mann/Case/Giammaria 45 + 1m14.125s 43. LMP1 #8 Toyota Davidson/Lapierre/Buemi 45 + 2m16.770s 44. GTEP #79 Porsche MacNeil/Curtis/Bleekemolen 43 + 10 Laps 45. GTEA #76 Porsche Narac/Armindo/Hallyday 42 + 11 Laps 46. LMP2 #27 Oreca Zlobin/Salo/Ladygin 42 + 1m17.888s 47. GTEA #62 Ferrari Mallegol/Bachelier/Blank 42 + 1m17.988s 48. LMP2 #48 Oreca Berthon/Gonzalez/Chandhok 32 + 21 Laps 49. LMP2 #41 Zytek Munemman/Latif/Winslow 31 Retired 50. GTEP #71 Ferrari Rigon/Kaffer/Beretta 28 Retired 51. LMP1 #3 Audi Albuquerque/Bonanomi/Jarvis 25 Retired 52. GTEA #81 Ferrari Wyatt/Rugolo/Bird 22 Retired 53. LMP2 #37 Oreca Ladygin/Minassian/Mediani 9 Retired 54. CDNT #0 Nissan Ordonez/Reip/Motoyama 5 Retired
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