Toyota are 1-2 and separated by just 16 seconds while the gap has come down by ten seconds. Buemi continues to search for performance. Porsche #92 in the pit lane and we will see the #22 United Autosport entry cop a penalty for speeding in a slow zone. Michael Christensen remains in Porsche #92. Shane van Gisbergen, the Australian Supercars ace, he is racing in the #74 Riley Motorsports Ferrari 488 GTE and Sam Bird, his team mate, observes how drivers are having a hard time transitioning back to the daylight and making mistakes not that it is indeed Sunday morning. The track is littered with stones and signboards.
Roy Carroll and Bill Riley were the people to put in this situation. Sam Bird had to choose between Formula E and his Ferrari contract and lost his Ferrari contact due to a clash between Formula E and WEC double scheduling races on the same weekend as we see the #77 Dempsey Proton Porsche doing a brake change. Thomas Merrill and WeatherTech Porsche leading GTE Am. Sebastian Priaulx is driving the #77 Dempsey Proton Porsche. WRT are third in LMP2. They are behind both Penske and Jota. #31 had a tandem spin with Vector Sport. Sean Gelael and Sebastien Bourdais. Blue flags are not respected enough in FIA WEC competition somehow or other.
Larry Holt from Multimatic says that the #77 Dempsey Proton Porsche needed a brake change. WRT pit. Sean Gelael at the wheel. Porsche #88 just pitted as well at Dempsey Proton. The brakes are pre bled before they are changed to make it so there is no air in the system and the caliper has fluid in it already. It is a dry brake system. Blue flags shown to Francois Perrodo out of Tertre Rouge. That's odd. Perrodo being chased down by Laurents Horr. David Heinemeier-Hanssson at Inter Europol in the garage for service. They were midfield in LMP2 at one point. They have dropped to 12th and 13th. Intereuropol is a baking manufacturer out of Poland of course.
DKR Engineering #3 is in the pit lane. Sebastien Buemi is so intense about the braking on the #8 Toyota. He is high strung, high revving, fiery. Dane Cameron chasing down Nicklas Kruetten. ON throttle, the electric motors of a hybrid race car will slow the car down. It is like a lift and coast but done electronically. Will Owen leads LMP2 for United Autosport as the running order is shown. Never mind. Jota #38 is the leading car as we see the battle between Cool Racing a tTeam Penske. The order shuffling around while we watch Ben Keating, third in GTE Am in Aston Martin #33. Ben Keating, Henrique Chaves, and Marco Sorensen.
Paul Dalla Lana in the lane in the #98 AMR Aston Martin and Alexander West had a drivehsaft lock up in the Garage 59 Ferrari/ The drive shaft was totally gone. Dane Cameron put off the road by the #57 Car Guy Ferrari of Takeshi Kimura or the Iron Lynx car as Tommy Milner finishes his stint in the #64 Corvette C8.R now with Alexander Sims at the controls. Ferrari feel they just don't have the car to fight with the other contenders like Porsche, Corvette, and Aston Martin. They won Spa last time but in blended weather conditions while having little to no speed in the dry with a tad over eight and a half hours to go in the race.
Dane Cameron now in the pits for Team Penske. TDS Racing x Vaillante are getting into the picture again after Jota and Sean Gelael had to take a penalty. Prema and Robert Kubica were booking it in the first stint. Antonuo Felix Da Costa, Will Stevens, and Roberto Gonzalez at Jota have all had incredible p-pace. Lorenzo Colombo, Prema's Silver driver has done well too. He had a lack of performance but is turning that around. Traffic jam in the lane as the #79 WeatherTech Porsche was but on the trolleys while Brendon Hartley was getting into the #8 Toyota.
Nico Lapierre is plauing catch up in recovery mode. Toyota #7, Mike Conway out, Jose Maria Lopez, in. Ben Barker slides on fluid on the road spewing out of his own car and spins into the gravel trap througn the Porsche Curves! Yikes! He is now in the pit lane. Eight and a half hours to go. Matthieu Vaxiviere in fifth in the Alpine chases the second place #8 Toyota of Brendon Hartley. Tire energy is another form of energy being discussed in the Hypercar ranks and that is odd with the Alpine guys because the Alpine does not have a hybrid unit like the Toyota's do.
Daniel Serra in the #51 Ferrari is third in GTE Pro. Shane van Gisbergen cops a penalty for abusing track limits on this Sunday morning. The Andretti's, Justin and Derek Bell, those are a couple father and son teams, the Rosier's, the Lafargue's more recently, the Felbermayr's raced here at Le Mans I believe. They've been around a long time. The Mansell's can be added to that list and a car goes off at Karting corner. That is Christophe Cresp of France in the #27 CD Sport LMP2 car. The #92 GTE Pro [orsche has lost the front end! This is blown right front tire and more!
Oh my God! What has happened here, down to Indianapolis. Michael Christensens off in the gravel and then continues, but, the tire I believe explodes, and it does! The puncture absolutely destroyed the whole front end of that Porsche! Jeepers creepers! Ferrari and Corvette will be licking their lips in anticipation. Porsche #92 was comfortably leading. He had a huge lockup and went through the gravel at Mulsanne and a brake lockup may have caused the tires to delaminate, ripping the front end off the car. They had this race in the bag with seven hours and 40 minutes left in the moto race.
My word! That was unbelievable. That's it. Game over for the #92 Porsche! The tire gets more square and the vibration gets worse and worse. The splitter and the pickup points on the chassis are totally broken on the Porsche. Richard Lietz in the sister #91 Porsche is going to move up. By the time he gets to the pit lane, it will be modular, but if the mounting points don't work, it is game over. The tire flailing. Whack, whack, whack, whack, whack. Laurens Vanthoor is ready to go, but this is going to be a long fix.
This incident had to be a driver error, getting a puncture through the stony gravel that is in these gravel traps here at Le Mans. Davide Rigon in the #52 AF Corse Ferrari is behind the Porsche. Refuel the car and then put it in the box to see if they can fix this thing. A big lockup and the tires seem fine, but then, the stones just punture the tires in a big way. He was well into his second stint for sure. Pit report Duncan Vincent might be able to tell us what is going on. There is more than one stint on that tire, probably a double stinted tire.
The pit crew has to rip 0ff the damaged bodywork and that is all they can do, readying a new splitter and making these modern GTE and GT3 cars modular. Oh no! The #7 Toyota is stopped on the road! This is the same thing that happened with the #8 of Ryo Hirakawa at Spa last time out. He stops out of Arnage corner! No drive. Mike Conway absolutely gutted. Stop the car. Power cycle. Error 1. Lopez is back on track, and the Toyota's are three laps up over the best Glickenhaus, the #709. Team boss Rob Leupen looking on. Go to the back of the garage. That is the plan. The car is in the lane now.
The car is being recycled. It is not safety. Red light. There is an HV problem. It is not safe to touch the car. Red light. Red alert. Don't touch the car. Cycle the car so it is safe. Power cycle and wit for five seconds before ignition. The car is unsafe during the power cycle. The mechanics have the electrical protection on because if you touch the car, you get zapped. You are a dead man. In replay, he just slows down and runs out of power between Indianapolis and Arnage. They are now fueling the car but it will go into the garage. Wait a minute. He is back on track. All it needed was a power cycle?
That's wild. Thomas merrill has the #79 Porsche off the road, and he was jolly lucky he spun in the other direction into the gravel trap on the inside and he is able to get back on the road, thankfully, third in GTE Am. There's sand and stones and oil and all sorts of clag on the road. Jose Maria Lopez is now a lap down to the #8. Electronics playing up but now the car sounds fine and seems to be performing. They have a bespoke hybrid system on the car. Richard Westbrook in the #709 Glickenhaus is still third.
Richard Lietz has the #91 Porsche 911 RSR-19 in the lane in GTE Pro. They will do a brake change on the #91. Dempsey Proton did a faster brake change than the works team. Quick brake change in the lane and the #63 Corvette C8.R also in the pit lane right at the tail end of the field. Jose Maria Lopez now runs second one lap dwont ot the #8. Is the hybrid unit playing up? Frustration on the part of Jose Maria Lopez. The #22 United Autosport Oreca is in the lane. Michael Christensen says that the Porsche had a rear tire puncture and they have to look at the data. Roberto Gonzalez now in the lane from the LMP2 lead.
Christensen says locking the right front brake was enough to blow the tire somehow or other. They just don't know the reason. Christensen is totally gutted and understandably so. He knew he had a slow rear puncture and was only ten laps into his stint. Oliver Jarvis passes Sean Gelael for sixth in LMP2 and he is a minute behind TDS Racing while Cool Racing have Ricky Taylor driving. Will Stevens leading the class over Robert Kubica and Ed Jones.
Drive through penalty for Richard Heistand and the #80 Iron Lynx Ferrari.
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