Its a battle between Negrao and Yamashita, look, for position. Signatech Alpine and Negrao decide discretion is the better part of valor. Porsche #92 in the lane for tires. Kevin Estre is back into the race. A driver change it looks like, but not sure if it is for Porsche or Ferrari. Mike Simpson is being caught by Bruno Senna. Job van Uitert is passed by the #37 Jackie Chan DC Racing car. Charlie Robertson's race is going pear shaped with a drive through penalty for the contact with the MR Racing Ferrari. More pit action. No driver change at Porsche for the #91 car. The Ginetta is being harried at the moment. The fuel flow meters that regulate the allowance of fuel, are attached to the side of the car. The systems can sometimes get fowled and don't send out the right signals so the marshals can monitor them.
Bruno Senna is trying hard to get around Mike Simpson. Senna has the grip. Simpson is having a tough old time of it right now with his tires which could be knackered. Simpson just cannot get the power down. Norman Nato does go by. The AER engine is running so cool, they will need a thermostat on it. It is easier to shrink rather than enlarge a radiator. But an oversized radiator just creates drag. Christian Ried is in the lane from the LM GTE Am lead. There's nose damage on the car as well. The battle for third continues between Mike Simpson and Bruno Senna. Charlie Robertson served a drive throuhgh penalty for that argy bargy we saw with the #70 Ferrari. GT cars need the same track that the LMP cars do. It's always been that way in sports car racing. Leave enough room if you are in a quicker car.
Job van Uitert pits for fresh tires. Michael Christensen has taken over the #92 Porsche 911 RSR-19 from Kevin Estre. Split the difference between your team strategy. Jean Eric Vergne takes over at G-Drive from Job van Uitert as Giedo van der Garde pits from sixth in class. van der Garde was dropping like a stone. We have double waved yellows for debris on the road in one corner. Only a local yellow. Jota Sport has an extra nose ready if needed. Frits van Eerd is now in the Racing Team Nederland car. van Eerd is an Am, Bronze driver, and needs a minimum of two hours behind the wheel in this motor race. Jota vs. High Class in LMP2. Both teams on Goodyear tires. Anthony Davidson is running very well, a former LMP1 champion, with Toyota.
Davidson is a very competitive driver, though. Andre Negrao holds down third in class right now. Signatech Alpine will have to conserve their tires with less sets than everyone else has. Ooh. Ho Pin Tung has to let Anthony Davidson by as we are an hour and 15 minutes into the action. There's a long way to go yet in this final race of a calendar year and of the current decade. Today, we are doing as many hours of racing as Silverstone and Shanghai combined. Traffic ahead for Sebastien Buemi and also for Mike Simpson. Simpson and Buemi go through the gap created by the LM GTE Am cars as Nicklas Nielsen has taken over the #83 AF Corse Ferrari.
Sebastien Buemi is monstering Mike Simpson at the moment. Simpson is doing a wonderful job with tire management right now. Buemi runs past Simpson, and poor old Simpson outbrakes himself. He had the acceleration and the traction. Alexandre Coigny is also being hounded by Andrea Belicchi in the Cetilar Dallara. From the outside, they look like they are racing on a cobblestone street instead of a smooth track. Harrison Newey drove the car at the 24 Hours of Le Mans at the end of the "super season" last year, and the son of legendary F1 designer Adrian Newey, said the Dallara drives like a "pogo stick". The tire compound choices are soft and medium. Mike Simpson is in the lane, and handing the car over to Chris Dyson, racing his first WEC race in the Ginetta. His last WEC race was in 2013 at Silverstone in the Greaves Motorsport Zytek.
Chris Dyson races in the Trans Am championship here in the states. Mike Conway runs 49 seconds ahead of Bruno Senna. Alexandre Coigny is fending off the challenge from Racing Team Nederland. Coigny, the Swiss driver. Pit stop time for the #38 Jota Sport car. Anthony Davidson stays in the car. Roberto Gonzalez is not ready to get into the car just yet. Paul di Resta pits from the LMP2 lead. Giedo van der Garde passes Alexandre Coigny. In the lane now is Kenta Yamashita in the #33 High Class Racing Oreca. Yamashita sharing with Anders Fjordbach and Mark Patterson. Anthony Davidson and Kenta Yamashita are the quickest LMP2 drivers right now. Phil Hanson is now into the #22 United Autosport car as we watch a parachutist.
Bruno Senna now into the lane from second overall. Norman Nato will take over. Check that. Gustavo Menezes is next in. Never second guess your first guess with a driver change. An hour and a half into the race, with six and a half left to go. New tires for Gustavo Menezes. We see a battle in LM GTE Am. Ben Keating leads over Ross Gunn and Egidio Perfetti ahead of Charlie Eastwood. So, it's a stack, a sandwich of Porsche and Aston Martin in the Am class. We see a fly by, by the Bahrain Air Force and their F16s. Charlie Eastwood had a slow qualifying effort, but moves up a place on the Project 1 Porsche. Nyck Nielsen tries to find his way past Ben Barker in the #86 Gulf Racing Porsche, which of course, is not in the legendary orange and blue Gulf colors.
Cetilar in the lane, as the #47 does another driver change. Tomorrow is the Bahrain rookie test and you will hear more about that, in post-race highlights, maybe tomorrow, maybe on Monday. Toyota has made a pit stop. Not sure which car it was. Ah. It was #8. Gustavo Menezes has done the fastest lap for the #1 Rebellion. 1:45.5 and 1:45.4. Rebellion had a hub seal break which caused a brake fire, and blew the hub and the bearings out, and this was in practice. New tires and a driver change for the #8 Toyota. Kamui Kobayashi is now in the #7 car and Brendon Hartley is in the #8. Nick Nielsen, is in the lane, and he has been penalized for having a temperature in the cockpit that was higher than regulations state. A black and orange flag, a meatball, for excessive temperature in the cockpit.
The air temp is 23 degrees Celsius, and it has to be no hotter than 30 Celsius. It is cooler in Bahrain than normal. Some of the races have been as bad as 50 degrees Celsius, but not today. One of the Am class Ferrari's is in the lane. Jean Eric Vergne may be falling into the clutches of Phil Hanson in LMP2. The five second penalty for the #77 Porsche and the #62 Ferrari, actually for the Porsche, has been cancelled. No further action. Also, the #83 Ferrari, has had the repair done and Emmanuel Collard is the new driver. Ginetta had major brake overheating issues in Shanghai last time out. They have a new cooling system for this race.
Jordan King, on new tires in the #5 Ginetta has been up and down the order. Bahrain is the circuit that is toughest on brakes through the season. The average number of safety cars is low. The fact this race is longer than usual, it does not matter. History is on the side of few safety cars and lots of green flag running. No further action on the racing incident for Alessandro Pier Guidi in the #51 AF Corse Ferrari he shares with James Calado. In GTE Am, Ben Keating is still being harried by Ross Gunn. It is Porsche vs. Aston Martin, Porsche #57 and Aston Martin #98. We are in thr witching hour, approaching darkness. The lights illuminate the circuit. We have six hours to go by 5PM in about thirteen minutes, but it will be pitch black.
Watch how you are driving for the rest of this race as we have the full length of a normal WEC race still left. Ben Keating and Ross Gunn will have passed the minimum drive time. So, they need to put in their other two drivers on the team. Only two gentleman drivers, Ben Keating, and Egidio Perfetti both for Project 1. Thomas Flohr is also in the #54 Ferrari. But, Perfetti has handed over to the Dane, David Heinemeier-Hanson, the racing businessman. Ben Keating continues to lead LM GTE Am and Ross Gunn is closing, fast. Egidio Perfetti will still need 25 minutes to round out his stint. Watch the race strategy. Minimum for a Bronze rated driver in GTE Am is two hours and 20 minutes. Look for a very long safety car if that becomes an opportunity.
Porsche, in GT Le Mans, the #91 changed left side tires while the #92 sister car changed all four tires. They are checking tire wear between those two different strategies. We spoke of the collision between Red River Sport and Dempsey Proton. The five second penalty has been handed to Red River Sport, somehow. Bonamy Grimes was trying to pass Christian Ried, and there was argy bargy, someplace. Aurus #26 is in the lane. Ross Gunn has continued to battle with Ben Keating. Jean Eric Vergne continues his driving stint in the G-Drive Aurus. You need spatial awareness in all racing, and Vergne can do that well being a Formula E driver. He can apply his skills from Formula E, and energy management, to this endurance race in the WEC, here in Bahrain.
Kamui Kobayashi leads by 42 seconds, but he is having issues with trying to pass the Ginetta, Chris Dyson at the wheel of it. Gustavo Menezes is eating away a gap, catching the top two in LMP1. Racing Team Nederland have also had tire issues. TDS Racing has not got a handle on their tire strategy for either Racing Team Nederland or G-Drive. Just keep driving. The driver is trying to manage his tires. Sure. He has a limited view. The engineer gives him an idea of what is going on but also has to be a psychologist and say, "don't worry. Just keep running your race." As the rubber goes down on the track, the grip goes up. Gianmaria Bruni is under three tenths of a second slower than Aston Martin. Trouble too, look, for David Heinemeier Hanson as the Project 1 Porsche is now back in the garage for repairs.
They have an overheating issue on the Porsche and a loose component at the front of the car. There's a dive plane that has come off one of the cars and is track debris, and the #6 Ginetta of Chris Dyson has spun off the road. The grip difference between on and off line, is going to get worse. Stay on the line, as we are now at nighttime.
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