Porsche are carrying 40 kilograms more weight than Aston Martin or Ferrari. Porsche was given an extra liter of fuel overnight per stint. Very similar to how things happened with Aston Martin here last year. #28 for IDEC Sport has the door open. They've had a fraught weekend here, and it continues. Paul Lafargue, Paul Loup Chatin, and Richard Bradley, are on the back foot. Track limit warnings for Eurasia, and others as we watch some slow motion replays. What a grear retro livery for the Wynn's Porsche, throwing back to the Porsche 962s in IMSA in the 1980s. No one else bought a customer Ford GT besides Ben Keating who won GTE Am here last year but then was disqualified giving the win to the team he drives for now, Team Project 1.
Jeroen Bleekemolen is driving, alongside Ben Keating and Felipe Fraga. The Dutchman sharing with the American car owner, and the Brazilian. These blokes have run together in a Mercedes in the IMSA WeatherTech championship in the past. James Calado has moved around Nicki Thiim, reading the situation and flying down the Mulsanne straight as they both got stymied by the Iron Lynx Ferrari, the #60 car I believe. Porsche #92 is seventh in class in GTE Pro. They've dropped like a stone, have the sister Porsche 911 RSR-19 of Kevin Estre, Michael Christensen, and Laurens Vanthoor. A team like Porsche would have foreseen trouble. They've got the data and the stats. One wonders what has happened to these blokes. Some close action and some carbon fiber bashing the Ferrari's windscreen.
Porsche are looking at the big picture. They are trying to save tires in their allocation. The GT classes have 60 tires, 52 for LMP2, 48 for LMP1. Rebellion are in the lane for a bodywork change, a rear wing change. Michael Christensen had been told Gianmaria Bruni in the sister car wants to go by. Christensen may be on a split strategy. Rebellion #1 in the lane and so is the #47 Cetilar Villorba Corse Dallara LMP2 car. That's an all Italian driver lineup, but the Dallara just does not have the downforce. They have had trouble with porpoising all over the place. Giorgio Sernagiotto, Roberto Lacorte, and Andrea Belicchi are up to fourth place in LMP2.
Mike Conway in the lane for service. Bruno Senna has also made a stop. They're on their second or third stops in most cases. ByKolles has stopped five times and Rebellion, four times at least with the #3, Nathaniel Berthon at the wheel of it. No change in LMP2 in the race order but it might swap at the end of the current lap. In GTE Am, the Ross Gunn/Paul Dalla Lana/Augusto Farfus Aston Martin #98 have been bish bash boshing it as of late. Don't forget the TF Sport #90 car either. Salih Yoluc of Turkey sharing with Charles Adam and Jonny Adam.
In LMP2, Filipe Albuquerque is being monstered by James Allen who is flying. Will Stevens is also motoring at the moment. We could get some rain later tonight. That's the forecast. What a shame that Amato Ferrari and his team, were vandalized last night. What an outrageous deal that is. In the meantime, the battle is on for the lead at Toyota between Mike Conway and Sebastien Buemi. Sometimes the hybrid system can wisp smoke. Sebastien Buemi has been really quick. Conway had one tire changed. He wants to know what was changed on the car. Buemi is cooking with rocket fuel at the moment.
Risi Competizione and WeatherTech are high up in GTE Pro order right now. We've not mentioned the #30 car, for Duquiene Engineering. Tristan Gommendy of France sharing with Jonathan Hirschi from Switzerland, and Konstantin Tereschenko from Russia. The Porsche Curves are the most fearsome part of this circuit and are really fast, skirting the old, equally fearsome Maison Blanche. Rebellion #1 bounds over the curbs at the Ford Chicane! That's a mega size bump and you feel it when you are sitting way down on the floor in a prototype.
22 hours and 32 minutes left. Sebastien Buemi is on his in lap and he is bish bash boshing it, with a gap of 3.8 seconds on his pit stop. #7 takes over the lead with Mike Conway. Bruno Senna and Nathaniel Berthon for Rebellion remain third and fourth. In LMP2, it's a revolving door as James Allen takes the class lead over Filipe Albuquerque who is second in class followed by Kenta Yamashita. Antonio Felix Da Costa and Simon Trummer battle for 12th in class. Alex Lynn leads LM GTE Pro for Aston Martin followed by Ferrari and Miguel Molina and James Calado, so #71 followed by #51, and Nicki Thiim is next up for Aston Martin. Ross Gunn leads Charlie Eastwood in GTE Am with Matteo Cairoli next in class in third.
Porsche are caboose on the field in GTE Pro. Very frustrating for Stuttgart at this time. They have their strategy they can work with to try and move back to the top of the tree and they are praying for rain right now. Tristan Gommendy and Jean Eric Vergne are having a good battle look, in LMP2 and we will also talk about InerEuropol Competition if we see them. Porsche #92 in the pit alne for scheduled service. Michael Christensen nin for refueling. This is the mid engine car with side mounted exhaust. Jakub Smiechowski, Rene Binder from Austria, and Russia's Matevos Isaakyan share the car for Inter Europol Competition, from Poland in LMP2. Filipe Albuquerque asking why James Allen is so darn fast. Allen is bish bash boshing it, and he's on a hot streak right now.
We've only run for an hour and a half. Early doors yet. Kenta Yamashita is flyuing right now and he wants by Filipe Albuquerque. Albuquerque is having issues with tire degradation as he is having the blowtorch applied by James Allen, look. Nonetheless, Kenta Yamashita is flying. He is a factory Lexus driver in Super GT and has done Super Formula as well. DragonSpeed pits. Juan Pablo Montoya may be handing over to one of his two team mates,
Filipe Albuquerque running defense into the Ford chicane as Yamashita tries him past a GTE Ferrari. Tit for tat, in traffic, look. Antonio Felix Da Costa is trying to move past the Cetilar car, a lap down and tenth in class in LMP2. The speed has evaporated for some of these LMP2 cars and speaking opf LMP2, the #11 car of Erik Maris is off the road in the marbles, in the gravel trap in the Porsche Curves? I think that's the esses. He took a wide line and got onto the marbles nwith cold tires on the car, understeering like no tomorrow. He was lucky to reach the tarmac access road. Countryman Adrien Tambay is sharing the car with Maris and so is Belgian driver Christophe D'Ansembourg.
More scrapping in LMP2, look, as James Allen is having a nightmare come true with Filipe Albuquerque all over him. Yikes! Pit stop time for another LMP2 car. Can't tell who it is. These are great battles we are seeing. It's fantastic. The LMP2 machines are flying right now, running 3:36 laps or so. There's a yellow flag for the #11 Eurointernational machine that had that spot of bother earlier. D'Ansembourg is a debut racer at Le Mans. Erik Maris is at the wheel of it right now and it could be game over. Adrien Tambay of course, is the son of former Formula 1 driver Patrick Tambay. Aston Martin are able to eat up Ferrari on the straights. They got pegged in last year's race which hobbled their performance. But this year, they are pushing hard and are extremely quick.
United Autosport in the pit lane for a driver change. It's been a good while. Everyone is in the lane. Allen, Albuquerque, and Vergne. Multi class racing and traffic, that's what endurance racing is all about. Traffic management is critical. Kenta Yamashita i spushing, pushing, pushing. The Porsche Curves are so difficult for LMP2s especially if they are following well driven GTE Pro automobiles. Ferrari in and out for both AF Corse and WeatherTech. Toni Vilander staying in the car and so is James Calado, sharing with Daniel Serra and Alessandro Pier Guidi. WeatherTech Racing want to win Le Mans and so they are in GTE Pro for a statistical choice, wanting to roll the dice.
Pit stop time as well for another LMP2 car. You have to commit to a corner, and so, watch out for the clag and the gravel on the outside. Prototypes have to use superior handling to get by safely. But the GT cars are still going for it. One of the AF Corse Ferrari's is now in the garage, working on the front bulkhead of the car as the #7 Toyota is in the lane frokm the lead for scheduled service. Mike Conway is still in the car. Sebastien Buemi is now second behind Conway. Buemi is out of sync. There is a mechanism in Le Mans rules called Equivalence of Technology, for the non hybrid privateer LMP1 cars that don't run hybrid systems. Toyota has had the advantage on refueling. That is now gone. We have a straight fight between Toyota, Rebellion, and ByKolles.
Job van Uitert, the Dutchman, is chasing Phil Hanson in the sister car for United Autosport. On the run to Arnage, Phil Hanson gets a little crossed up, and in flying through the entry to right hander, gets twitchy. Bury the throttle and go, but no adhesion with flattened pavement on the exit, driver's right, flying over the curbs and into the gravel. That was a close shave! Sports car racing offers a wide variety of categories, but also, privateer teams that can give young professional drivers a sliver of hope about racing. He needs guidance and coaching by pro drivers alongside him, whereas with open wheel racing, you have just 25 or so paid seats depending on if its Formula 1 or IndyCar for example. Many F1 teams have junior squads, but the old guard are actually staying on in F1.
Sports car racing can provide a better chance for junior drivers, especially with testing banned in F1. These drivers just want to drive and sports car racing gives that opportunity.
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