There is a place in the world, where the advent of summer, is celebrated, with a motor race, like no other. The 92nd running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, celebrates the dawn of this magnificent motor race's second century. This year, the Hypercar class is even bigger. Ferrari, defending champions are back this year, with three cars, as opposed to two, as they are doing all they can to defend last year's rather unexpected crown. Cadillac, with their charges from Chip Ganassi Racing, and Action Express Racing, return for a second year, in the Hypercar class, to Le Mans. Porsche have widely expanded their presence to include three factory Penske Motorsports Porsche 963's, one of which, the #6 car of Laurens Vanthoor, Kevin Estre, (the man who accomplished the feat), and Andre Lotterer, are on the pole for the race today.
Porsche has several customer 963's entered in this race. Two cars from Hertz Team Jota, and one from Proton Competition, to bolster their efforts. The French lion of Peugeot is back this year, already three-time winners at Le Mans in 1992, '93, and 2009, they are taking another shot with the new 9X8 model that now has a rear wing. Their French compatriots Alpine are back in the top class, in Hypercar, for the first time ever, trying to rekindle the magic they found in a win in this race way back in 1978. BMW return to the top category at Le Mans for the first time since winning this race overal a quarter century ago in 1999.
Lamborghini are back in force, too, with their all new SC63 prototype, and so is a brand that is making it's return to auto racing for the first time in more than 90 years, the Italian marque of Isotta Fraschini, with a single Tipo 6C Competizione Hypercar. Toyota had their thunder stolen by the Prancing Horses last year, and they want that thunder back, and will do everything they can, with their two-car team to get it, with former Le Mans winning drivers like Kamui Kobayashi, Jose Maria Lopez, Sebastien Buemi, and Brendon Hartley, on their team. The absent winner is Mike Conway, injured in an off-track accident before the race, he will not race Le Mans this year.
So, it should be a race that we will see mainly perhaps, between Ferrari, Toyota, and Porsche, for overall victory. The LMP2 class is only appearing at Le Mans this year, having been dropped from the full-season WEC. But, there are 16 Oreca 07 chassis, which will stick around in the class now, according to the ACO for the next five years. So, we will be seeing the current LMP2 formula drawn out for a long time to come. The other new equation for the first time at Le Mans is the GT3 class, exotic sports cars replacing their far more exotic GTE bespoke supercar counterparts with supercars that are built to the standard formula of production sports car racing used by other sanctioning bodies such as SRO and IMSA and now incorporated into FIA World Endurance Championship racing. You will see cars from BMW, McLaren, Ferrari, Aston Martin, Chevrolet, Ford, Lexus, Lamborghini, and Porsche, battling for class honors for the very first time here at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. If you're ready, I'm ready. This is the 92nd 24 Hours of Le Mans! It's live, and it's next!
Welcome to one of the biggest races in the world. We are all set to go. It is so special. We all get goosebumps before this race starts. The adrenaline, the focus, it is all there. Eliminate risk, make it through the night. This is going to be fun! We have Eurosport for the coverage with Tom Kristensen and Alex Brundle. The tension is palpable as we get ready to go, on this hallowed tarmac. This is a new century because we had the centenary last year. 23 Hypercars from nine brands. The quality and quantity have never been better. Sports car racing is in a golden era right now. Eliminate mistakes. A little luck goes a long, long way.
Jethro Bovington, our Eurosport pit report interviews 2016 FIA WEC champion Mark Webber. Drivers are relaxing but getting set to go. The race is flat out all the time as we know from the race last year, the centenary last year, on the centenary. Porsche on the pole, they have a strong lineup as Mark Webber, he is an ambassador for Porsche. The field is so deep! It is incredible. This year more than others that the drivers, the strategy, the tire strategy, the mixed conditions. There are many races taking place between Hypercar, LMP2, and GT3. 62 cars, 186 drivers. LMP2 is a guest category for Le Mans only.
Jenson Button is in his first chance to win overall at Le Mans after the 2018 effort in the BR LMP1 and last year with the Garage 56 NASCAR Cup Series Chevrolet Camaro ZL1. Button is a Formula 1 champion. Tom Kristensen of course, won this race with a privateer Porsche spyder prototype in 1997. Le Mans is so incredibly special. We all know. 23 Hypercars, the competition level is hot! NFL star, Tom Brady, the football player. He is here and is part of the Jota team. The team has rebuilt the car after an accident in the last 30 hours. They want to be the underdog champions this year. They are on a mission.
Their skillset, their minds, the decisions and processes they go through, the drivers and the crew. Valentino Rossi started in go karts and then went to motorcycles and dominated! Now, he is back in cars, and he is now in the #46 Team WRT BMW M4 GT3 in the GT3 class teaming up with Maxime Martin and Ahmad Al Harthy. Rossi won the Road to Le Mans in a BMW M4 GT3 a year ago, the support race. He wants the podium this year. The dream is to win, to arrive on the podium. Do not take La Chapelle after Dunlop because that is the short course for the motorcycles for MotoGP and for the 24 Hours of Le Mans Motos. 25 years ago, BMW won Le Mans and now they are back in the top class with the BMW M Hybrid V8 Hypercar. Tom Kristensen raced witb BMW in 1999 but did not finish after leading by three laps!
Marco Wittmann will start the top BMW behind the #35 Alpine A424B. Pierre Gasly is here with Alpine who he races for in Formula 1, to cheer on his team. He lived and studied in Le Mans for a while. Le Mans and a win is a dream. Now he is focusing on F1 but in the future, he could be here in the very near future. Gasly has lots of friends who he raced against years ago. This is going to be very extreme. Appreciate how difficult this race is. We talk and talk about it, year after year. But it is so true! Richard Hammond from "Top Gear" fame, is here to soak up the atmosphere of this race. The event has changed. The Hypercars will be fabulous. We are paying homage to the drivers, the teams, and the cars.
Ferrari F1 boss Fred Vasseur is here to support the three AF Corse Ferrari 499P's and Ferrari won the Monaco Grand Prix with native Monegasque, Charles Leclerc. Last year, Ferrari won, and they are now trying to defend the title. The fight is very tight and very real. Drivers James Calado and Antonio Giovinazzi are ready, it is just another race for them to do their best and to enjoy it. Watch for the rain especially tomorrow morning before we end. No tire warmers this year. That will be a big concern but just get on with it. That is what we're about to do. Cadillac had a fabulous performance in qualifying for the two Chip Ganassi Racing cars including the #3 spearheaded by Le Mans native son Sebastien Bourdais. We will get showers from over the Atlantic later on.
Everyone has good radars and can see the weather coming but we don't know how much there will be or when it is coming. Watch out if it happens at night. It is the same for everybody as we get set to go, Bourdais sharing with Scott Dixon and Renger van der Zande. Porsche have done very well this year so far and Kevin Estre scored pole with the #6 Porsche 963 for Team Penske. Porsche going for history with their 20th win. The car is quick, but Kevin Estre was wrestling the car in qualifying, and we are set to hear from him. Estre tells us the lap was very difficult and he was not sure if he had enough fuel and was in LMP2 traffic.
No mistakes. Enjoy the race but push hard. That is what the Porsche's want to do. Former F1 driver Romain Grosjean is here and ready to go. He is in one of the two Lamborghini SC63 Hypercars for Lamborghini Iron Lynx. Grosjean sharing with Italians Andrea Caldarelli and Matteo Cairoli aboard the #19 Lamborghini SC63. Neel Jani in 14th place is starting the #99 Proton Competition Porsche 963 alongside Julien Andlauer and Harry Tincknell. Edoardo Mortara is starting the second Lamborghini #63 with co-drivers Daniil Kvyat and Mirko Bortolotti. The #83 AF Corse Ferrari 499P in yellow is next on the grid with Robert Kubica, Yifei Ye, and Robert Shwartzman.
The trophy is being paraded to the front of the grid. Toyota, after a defeat last year, they could very well come back but Ferrari and Porsche will give them a run for their money. They don't like not winning. They want to come back and go for it. There are so many contenders and now we have La Marseillaise, the French national anthem. The French national anthem has been sung as we get set to go. Soccer player Zivian Zidane is here to wave the flag, the French Trois Couleurs. Kamui Kobayashi from Toyota a former winner, is the man of honor.
We also have Alex Jacques, Formula 1 commentator, here to do the play by play as well. The Trois Couleurs is being delivered by the French military. This is a wonderful moment to drink it in and enjoy what is going on. Fans will be in the grandstands and clinging to the catch fences to watch. This is the 92nd 24 Hours of Le Mans, Kazuki Nakajima is the Grand Marshal. 62 cars, three classes, 186 drivers. This is a battle of the circuit as well. Le Mans is very similar to cycling because it just takes everything out of you. Not just the drivers, but the pit crews, the teams.
In another 20 minutes we are going to get started. In 11th place, it is the #8 Toyota GR010 of Sebastien Buemi, Ryo Hirakawa, and Brendon Hartley. The winning car will complete over 300 laps. We are getting ready to go. Enormous focus, get the systems set, get the tire temperatures up. The adrenaline is flowing like crazy. The starting drivers have a massive responsibility. Don't get in trouble, stay sane, stay smart. Nyck de Vries is back in the WEC after a short stint in Formula 1.
A very warm welcome from the medieval city of Le Mans, with the largest grid of car manufacturers ever seen here at the 24 hours. 23 Hypercars from nine manufacturers. BMW return, Lamborghini debut. The cars are on their reconaissance lap. LMP2 remains but as a guest class and we have the new GT3 cars. The Hypercars are at the front of the grid generating the heat into their tires. Toyota are desperate to reclaim the crown as we said. Lexus #78 starting from pit lane as Kevin Estre, the pole man, and his co-driver Laurens Vanthoor, who starts the race today.
It is uncharacteristically cold here at Le Mans and there was a rain shower earlier in the day. It is green, and dry now. Medium and soft tires being used. The soft tire activates quicker but is not as durable. Michelin for the Hypercars. Goodyear for LMP2 and GT3. We'll have Lena Gade, three-time race winning engineer, helping us out with race strategy this weekend. Vanthoor leading the filed behind the safety car with Sebastien Bourdais alongside in the #3 Cadillac for Chip Ganassi Racing. Watch Charles Milesi and Marco Wittman in the Alpine and the BMW.
Then comes the #2 Cadillac and the #12 Hertz Team Jota Porsche 963 of Will Stevens, the car that crashed on Thursday in FP2. Nico Lapierre for Alpine and Fred Makowiecki for Penske Porsche followed by the #8 Toyota and the #83 AF Corse Ferrari 499P followed by Edoardo Mortara's Lamborghini, and the BMW. Watch out for some of the BMW's and then the #311 Action Express Cadillac, the #4 Penske Porsche, and the second Lamborghini and the Isotta Fraschini, followed by the #7 Toyota that won in 2021 at the back of the Hypercar grid.
AO Racing and IDEC head the LMP2 field along with Panis, United's two cars, and Cool Racing followed by DKR and Vector Sport. Then it is AF Corse, Inter Europol, and the rest. We won't be able to talk about GT3 yet because we are getting set to start. All Hypercars to grid formation. LMP2's get into grid formation. All gaps to be closed within the categories. LMGT3, you have big gaps, assume formation please. It is time to start. Roger Penske was on pole in 1963 as driver and he is on pole again as a team owner.
The French flag waves and away we go! Porsche to the lead with Kevin Estre and now, the Ferrari's are going side by side. The Cadillac will have the power and speed. The Cadillac on soft tires as Marco Wittmann in the BMW has a good start. There's some brake lockup as Nico Muller in the Peugeot wrright in the fight. Here comes the #50 Ferrari past the sister car and the Cadillac. The Alpine of Lpaierre fending off the Peugeot's. A bit of contact between the Ferrari and the leading Cadillac. Pipo Derani in the Action Express Cadillac making his way through the field as the #38 Jota Porsche does as well.
Laurens Vanthoor leads. The Proton Competition FAT Turbo Porsche hearknes back to the Group C days anow Nicklas Nielsen in Ferrari 499P #50 takes the lead! Holy cow! We have immediately had two leaders. Ferrari leads Le Mans with the #50. They won with #51 last year. Be so careful in this early phase as Paul di Resta in the #94 Peugeot 9X8 is also beginning to motor. Lap one done and dusted. We are going well beyond 300 laps in the next 24 hours as Alex Lynn in Cadillac #2 is hounding the BMW #15 of Marco Wittmann. Louis Deletraz leads LMP2 in car #14 "Spike" the dragon.
Sebastien Bourdais pressing Antonio Giovinazzi currently. Let's not get carried away. Thi si s amarathon. Every Hypercar in 2023 had trouble. Everyone is sorting themselves out currently. Lamborghini #19 wants to make a move but Andrea Caldarelli is looking to dive inside one of the BMW's. Pipo Derani encouraged on the radio. Everyone is doing great laps thus far. Trouble, maybe for one of the LMP2 cars but I don't know who. Charles Milesi's windscreen is extremely dirty in the #35 Alpine with the 3.4 liter turbo V6 motor. Maybe the team forgot to take off a tearoff. However, they need to be rationed.
The GT3 battle is hot and heavy as we go onboard the #46 WRT BMW M4 GT3 of Maxime Martin sharing with Valentino Rossi and Ahmad Al Harthy. The Hypercars fly down the Mulsanne straight as Lorents Horr and the DKR Engineering Oreca in the lane and the same for the #47 Cool Racing Oreca of Matt Bell in trouble. LMP2 could be a war of attrition just like last year. 22 of the 62 cars retired last year. Around 6PM and around 4AM tomorrow, we will get some rain, so have the rain tires ready to go.
Alex Lynn struggling in P8 ahead of one of the Alpine's. Maybe one of the Toyota's is venting fluid out the back. Lynn sharing with Earl Bamber and Alex Palou, the Ganassi IndyCar driver. #47 for Cool Racing. Charles Milesi told to use the wiper at low speed but he says he is having a hard time with it. Milesi has been behind someone who has been off the road or venting fluid. Toyota #8 of Sebastien Buemi is under investigation for track limits. So, the top three is the #50 Ferrari, the #6 Porsche, and the #51 sister Ferrari. Cadillac #3 in fourth followed by Robert Kubica in the #83 Ferrari.
In GT3, we are seeing similar lap times to the old GTE cars. Watch out when the Hypercars start blending into the GT3 field in four or five laps. 12 laps on fuel for Hypercars, 15 laps for GT3. Wow. Now, we have Antonio Giovinazzi making his move on the Porsche, the polesitter of Laurens Vanthoor. Vanthoor trying to respond to Antonio Giovinazzi as Ferrari run 1-2 currently. #6 Porsche 963 now in third place behind the two Ferrari 499P's. The pace is incredibly quick thus far. Pipo Derani says he has no top speed. Copy that. Keep going, sunbeam, keep going.
We are seeing laps in the 3:29 range and the track will improve and the track is completely green after all the rain. Now, the battle is on, look, in the GT3 class. Porsche, Aston Martin, Aston Martin, Lamborghini. The track has been a tad slower compared to last year at the centenary race and there is a headwind down the Mulsanne. Matt Bell is out of the #47 Cool Racing Oreca. We could see a long repair, or it could be game over. Jethro Bovington and the other pit reporters are working on getting us some information.
Nico Lapierre is team boss at Cool Racing while also a factory Alpine Hypercar driver. The safety car periods will see merging of the field an'll see that for sure. It is a drop back towards class leaders or the overall leaders as we see the battle betqeen Wittmann, Milesi, and Lynn. BMW M Hybrid V8, Cadillac V Series.R, Alpine A424. The LMP2 cars are all Oreca chassis with Gibson 4.2-liter V8 engines. Ferrari should be on medium compound Michelin tires. Yellow sidewalls for a medium and white for a soft. Ferrari have used a harder compound Michelin than everyone else through the season.
We have three available compounds, and the hard compound is not the best here at Le Mans. Soft compounds will be used at night. TF Sport Corvette vs. Proton Competitioon Mustang as one of the BMW's is off the road, the #15 of WRT and Marco Wittmann under massive pressure from the Alpine of Charles Milesi. He will drop down to the tail end of the Hypercars. Tail end Charlie, just ahead of the LMP2's. Vincent Vosse, boss of WRT, not happy. 20 minutes now on the board as the Iron Lynx Lamborghini and the Pure Racing Porsche under pressure from the third Proton Competition Ford Mustang GT3.
Callum Ilott of course had a shunt in qualifying on Wednesday night and they had to rebuild the car, from a Porsche Penske IMSA chassi. Will Stevens at the wheel of it. It is a monumental job to rebuild one of these Hypercars considering how complex they are. Gregoire Saucy in the #59 McLaren 720S for United Autosport being chased currently by one of the other cars I cannot see currently. The GT3 field is amazingly deep but the top speeds are so similar. McLaren, Ferrari, Porsche, Aston Martin. Ben Barker in the Ford Mustang GT3 pursuing Fredrik Schandorff in the Inception Racing McLaren. BMW to the pit lane.
They will be checking the car, Marco Wittmann off sequence completely. Through the Forest Esses, he hit a bump and spun off. The second place LMP2 battle raging on. Panis Racing vs. IDEC Sport, Mathias Beche vs. Job van Uitert. Filipe Albuquerque in the #23 United Autosports Oreca in a Pro-Am class LMP2. OEM's build the cars from scratch or from a base chassis from a manufacturer. Oreca spec LMP2's with Gibson Technologies V8's and the road-based cars are GT3. Porsche, McLaren, BMW, Ford, and more. All three races going on at the same time.
The GT3 cars are somewhat faster than the GT3 cars and the Ferrari has to go off the road to get by the GT3 cars! The Iron Dames Lamborghini stymies the #51 Ferrari 499P! The Hypercar drivers must be circumspect with their moves. The track was open to the public after finishing qualifying. Pipo Derani doing consistent laps, at position 14. Eight laps now complete, or seven, and now starting eight. We have been at it for half an hour. No further action for the #8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid of Sebastien Buemi. The penalties are long if a driver oversteps the boundaries. The Hypercars are now moving through the GT3 field. Alex Lynn told he has three laps to go in his current stint.
Hello to Mark Webber, a Porsche ambassador and commentator. Good to hear from you, Mark. This is madness. Keep it clean for 24 hours. Everyone is taking massive risks as we are watching the Cadillac chasing the Alpine. #2 chasing #36. Early on the debris is not so bad but you'll see tire debris collecting as they go through Indianapolis and then Arnage at theend of sector two. Find the balance ad know who you are dealing with. Laurens Vanthoor dropping back from pole to third spot. Felipe Nasr is the starting driver in the #4 Porsche Penske Motorsports Porsche 963 sharing with Nick Tandy and Matthieu Jaminet.
Ferrari flying in formation currently. Antonio Giovinazzi chasing Nicklas Nielsen. AXR Cadillac, Proton Porsche, Penske Porsche, actually, swap that. Penske ahead of Proton. Giovinazzi is now passing Nicklas Nielsen. Nine laps now on the board. The Porsche Curves give the tires a thrashing and on the way into Mulsanne the #50 Ferrari wriggles and almost gets into the kitty litter! Holy smokes! Now we see the mechanics possibly getting nervous before first pit stops. Porsche, Cadillac, Ferrari, and everyone else, there is so much at stake. The LMP2's have pitted so far and we await Hypercar pit stops.
Alex Lynn is now chasing Nico Lapierre and Fred Makowiecki as well as the others ahead. Milesi, Buemi, Kubica etc. Action Express in the pit lane for scheduled service. Hypercar and GT3 have virtual energy tanks on the telemetry along with the fuel tank itself. Porsche have more 963's than they have in the past. Manthey Porsche in GT3 being chased by one of the Akkodis ASP Lexus RC F GT3's. Proton Competition and Jota are the privateer Porsche's. Customer racing is a big deal. We saw the factory Porsche 919's very successful in LMP1. Stay out for an extra lap. First pit stop is important. Exhaust your fuel and your first stop length.
Fred Schandorff being harried by Ben Barker for the GT3 lead. McLaren vs. Ford Mustang. Toyota #7 in the lane for service piloted by Nyck de Vries. Ditto for Cadillac #2 and Porsche #4. Peugeot #93, Isotta Fraschini #11, BMW #15, and others in the Hypercar division are in the lane. The first stint is far shorter, but most of the Hypercars are running a dozen laps in this first stint and now more GT3 cars are in as well, look. All the GT3's are in the lane now. Both Ferrari's, another Porsche, and the #3 Ganassi Cadillac's are in, from the top four in the race. Don't get behind on the pit stops.
Ferrari are in, liner stern. Toyota #8 in as well. We have a quarter of an hour left before this opening hour is on the board. Both Jota Porsche 963's are in. A tight squeeze between the Ferrari and the #3 Ganassi Cadillac! Yikes! Porsche Penske #6 reclaims the lead. #51 has lost time as Antonio Giovinazzi loses ten seconds in his first pit stop. Porsche 963 #6 retakes the lead of the motor race. Sebastien Bourdais is reporting an unsafe release from the pit lane.
The leading LMP2 is the #9 Proton Competition Oreca. Bent Viscaal, and company. Viscaal the Dutchman, sharing with Germany's Jonas Ried, and Frenchman, Maceo Capietto. #23, United Autosport, he loses it in the Dunlop chicane, Ben Keating at the wheel of it, a local yellow on that turn. Ferrari #51 served a ten second penalty. Matthias Beche under pressure from Oliver Jarvis. We have a slow zone called. Ben Keating cannot start the car and must wait for the marshals to help. Keating sharing with Filipe Albuquerque and Ben Hanley. Ben Keating lost the rear end over the crest and spun. We cannot thank the marshals enough. Without them, we cannot race.
Yifei Ye at Ferrari had to serve a penalty, but they are looking healthy in the #83 Ferrari 499P. The weather is perfect but is going to change later. It is windy in Le Mans now. Slow Zone one has been removed and now we are back to racing. Sebastien Bourdais moving forward and now, Nicklas Nielsen making a move on Laurens Vanthoor for the lead! He got him. OK. Once again, it is a battle royal so far between Ferrari and Porsche as the track is in a very specific condition. We have such a long way to go.
The two LMP2 cars we saw are back on track after pit stops. Neel Jani just brought in the #99 Proton Competition Porsche 963. There is an unsafe release situation under investigationf or Nielsen in Ferrari #50. Toyota #8 is cooking right now, moving through the field. Ferrari, Porsche, Cadillac, Toyota, separated by nothing in the Hypercar class currrently and this is super close! My heavens! Estre's pole lap was a blinder and the LMDh spec chassis prototypes are extremely twitchy. One movable aero device. Take rear wing off and ditch the rake between the front and rear.
Squat the car and point it straight but then you will lose downforce. That Porsche 963 is extremely tail happy. Now, the #8 Toyota GR010 of Sebastien Buemi is right on the tail of the leaders. Toyota have not hit their stride yet save for a victory at Imola that was the result of changeable weather. Ben Barker, a longtime Porsche driver, now a factory Ford Mustang driver as the Hypercars are threading the needle through the GT3 traffic. Nielsen, Vanthoor, Bourdais, Buemi. Information to the pit lane, car #50 has ten seconds added to the next pit stop for unsafe release. All three Ferrari's have uncurred these time penalties. It is clear that the car in the working lane must merge with the car in the fast lane.
Toyota re the darkhorses as we heard from Tom Kristensen on the grid earlier today. The Alpine, new to the Hypercar class, they are really getting into the fight. They are 3.2 seconds away from the leaders. It is built and constructed just outside Le Mans, a home race for them. Pretty incredible. Alpine ran in LMP2 and now in Hypercar and they won in 1978 as well.
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