Le Mans latest (19)

No 18 BMW in pits and into garage. Two laps in hand over No 7 Audi.

11:48 (CET) Panoz No12 going well with new gearbox but five laps down on Courage in 8th.

11:45 (CET) Field settling down further. Looks unlikely that any car will catch car in front other than perhaps third place Toyota which could conceivably catch second place BMW

11.30 The leading BMW pits for a routine stop and so does the third placed number 3 Toyota. JJ Lehto stays behind the wheel of the leading car, and the mechanics check the underside of the machine. Meanwhile at Toyota, Katayama hands over driving duties to Suzuki.

Leaders after 20 and a half hours at 11:30 CET:

1 17 BMW (Kristensen, Lehto, Muller) 298 Laps

2 15 BMW (Winkelhock, Martini, Dalmas) 294 Laps

3 03 Toyota (Katayama, Tsuchiya, Suzuki) 294 Laps

4 08 Audi (Pirro, Theys, Biela) 290 Laps

5 18 BMW (Bscher,Auberlen, Soper) 288 Laps

6 07 Audi (Alboreto, Capello, Aiello) 276 Laps

7 21 Nissan (Cottaz, Goosens, Ekblom) 275 Laps

8 13 Courage (Montermini, Caffi, Schiattarella) 274 Laps

9 6 12 Panoz (Brabham, Bernard, Leitzinger) 272 Laps

10 51 Viper (Archer, Bell, Duez) 264 Laps


11.25 The number 11 Panoz also pits to have its rear bodywork checked.

11.20 The number 51 Viper which is leading the GTS Class is pulled into the pit garage for a complete check. The teams are all starting to drive the cars into the garages, rather than performing a pitstop in the pitlane, because inside the garages more than five mechanics are allowed to work on the cars and they can give it a quick once-over.

11.15 The number 11 Panoz loses its rear body work, but the team don't think that it will affect the lap times of the car too much. Justin Bell beats his fastest lap with a time of 4.00.060, and continues to run in 14th place.

11.10 The number 12 Panoz comes back into the garage after only one lap out. The team change the gearbox and estimate that they can do it in under half an hour. Butch Leitzinger says that he is enjoying the drive and that Le Mans is better than any Indy 500 he's ever seen.

11.05 The race has now been running for 19 hours and the BMW V12 LMR of Kristensen, Lehto and Muller has been leading for fifteen hours. The top ten are covered by a difference of 32 laps, with the number 51 Viper on 258 laps.

Frank Biela's pitstop in the number 8 Audi may have problems, as his pitstop was unscheduled.

11:00 (CET) No 18 fifth place BMW in to pits. Brake disc change, quite slow. No 11 Panoz in and out standard stop. Magnussen out O'Connell in. No 12 Panoz back out on track. Justin Bell sets his fastest lap of race.

Leaders after 20 hours at 11:00 CET:

1 17 BMW (Kristensen, Lehto, Muller) 290 Laps

2 15 BMW (Winkelhock, Martini, Dalmas) 286 Laps

3 03 Toyota (Katayama, Tsuchiya, Suzuki) 286 Laps

4 08 Audi (Pirro, Theys, Biela) 282 Laps

5 18 BMW (Bscher,Auberlen, Soper) 280 Laps

6 12 Panoz (Brabham, Bernard, Leitzinger) 271 Laps

7 07 Audi (Alboreto, Capello, Aiello) 267 Laps

8 21 Nissan (Cottaz, Goosens, Ekblom) 267 Laps

9 13 Courage (Montermini, Caffi, Schiattarella) 266 Laps

10 51 Viper (Archer, Bell, Duez) 258 Laps