Three Ferrari's in the top four in GTE Pro. Alessandro Pier Guidi and Fred Makowiecki will have irons in the fire for victory here at Le Mans. Watch out for where the safety cars are. Safety Car A has three cars behind it and they are released. Green flag. Safety car B and we have another slow zone here, I think. He can't go through any quicker. 3/4 of the field released into the slow zone. We have lost eight cars, so 54 remaining. The GTE Pro battle is what we are watching the Porsche slams down the inside and puts the squeeze play on there! Paul Dalla Lana had to get out of the way and Dalla Lana is behind the WeatherTech Porsche and the TF Sport Aston Martin. There goes the RealTeam LMP2 through Chemaine aux Boeufs and Tertre Rouge. The Porsche is bloced by the LMP2 car and by Pier Guidi!
Makowiecki gets balked twice! Holy mackerel! Breaking the draft down the Mulsanne, and Pier Guidi defends! These are top notch drivers. Can you imagine seeing this with GT3 cars at Le Mans? We'll see how that works. The Porsche has the legs and we have more double waved yellows into the slow zone as Giancarlo Fisichella nearly chopped off the GTE Pro leaders! Barrier repairs complete and this closes up the slow zone, so it's green all over Le Mans. The Porsche is let loose from behind the Am class Ferrari. Makowiecki loses ground.
Makowiecki will cloe the gap and at least one LMP2 car will have to make a green flag pit stop. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Slow zone removed. How does the Ferrari use all the traffic? Pier Guidi will need blockers. The Ferrari is quick under acceleration. Emmanuel Collard is chasing Tijmen van der Helm in LMP2. We have a number of LMP2 contenders. 12 laps completed in the current stint. This current stint is 13 laps old. Ferrari and Porsche can both run 13-15 laps. Richard Lietz is getting suited and booted for his stint. Fred Makowiecki is finally getting up to speed. Target acquired. Down the Mulsanne Straight, the Porsche might have terminal velocity into Mulsanne corner. There's more time to be found or lost in slow speed turns not high speed ones.
Wait for mistakes into slow speed corners. That is key. Pier Guidi and Makowiecki are sports car veterans. The Porsche #91 team of Gianmaria Bruni, Richard Lietz, and Fred Makowiecki have not been world champions. Sster cars ahead and the LMP2 car goes the long way around, a Pro-Am P2 car, the IDEC Sport entry I think. That is Patrick Pilet, a sometimes Porsche factory driver. But it isn't an IMSA Performance Matmut Porsche. Toyota #8 in the pit lane. #7 in as well, as Alessandro Pier Guidi leaves the track at the Dnlop chicane.
He does, he goes off and on and should give that place back. Fisichella goes across the gravel trap in the Daytona chicane on the Mulsanne straight in the #80 Iron Lynx Ferrari. Antonio Felix Da Costa leading LMP2 has cut two personal best sector times. But, the GTE Pro battle is what we want to see. No mistakes by either driver. Pier Guidi vs. Makowiecki. The Porsche might just have a speed advantage here. If you are ahead of a quicker car, keep him behind you. You cannot afford to ever give up the track position to the faster car. Makowiecki closing up. Will Alessandro Pier Guidi stay there?
Christian Ried brings the #77 Dempsey Proton Porsche, with Christian Ried in the car set to hand over on the next pit stop. Box this lap, driver change, tires, and fuel for the #91. Ferrari could play the same strategy. Jota almost have a lap over Prema. This is in the LMP2 battle. Gianmaria Bruni will take over the #91 Porsche. Both cars to the lane with the GTE Am leading WeatherTech Porsche as well. The gap comes right down on the brakes into the lane. No pressure for the pit crews, right? No. All kinds of pressure! This is why these team practice their pit stops at the factory.
#52 in the lane as well, a lap down, parked in front of the #51, ahead on the road. Tires ready for the Porsche. Time made up in the wheel change. No tires for #51. #91 down and away with fresh tires. Track advantage for Ferrari. Split strategy and straight off the road for Ferrari. Toyota #7 in the lane, two minutes, the gap. Kamui Kobayashi at the controls of #7. Just a tad over four and a half hours left. Fred Makowiecki and Richard Lietz looking on. Gianmaria Bruni was a star Ferrari driver before Porsche poached him. #51 Ferrari reported to the stewards for cutting the corner at Marshal Post three. It resets, and you have impunity to cut the chicane on the out lap.
Through Arnage. Tristan Vautier has to survive and get past the GT cars. Survive to the flag. Antonio Fuoco third in GTE Pro. Ferrari, Porsche, Ferrari, Porsche, Ferrari. Prema to then pit lane and we weclome Alastair Moffat to the booth. He is the Toyota press officer in his last race with the team. He says that it is such a busy time to build up to Le Mans and something to do all the time as Phil Hanson rolls to a stop in the #22 United Autosport car in LMP2. Game over for those boys, so, the #31 WRT will stay in it. Now, the #23 not the #22 is dead in the water, I think.
Ah. It is #22 with Phil Hanson, and he says "I've lost power." The crew says "stop the car and power cycle it." Race cars are a bugbear because they can be power cycled. You can't do that on your road car. The same deal is with your laptop computer at home. He just got the car back on track. Okie dokie then. The Toyota LMP1 cars were bulletproof with double hybrid motors. Now the Hypercar has a single motor. It is theoretically simpler, but the control systems are limited. It is more of a production car type system. That is what LMDh is going to be as well. They've reduced the Formula 1/Formula E type of tech. Tighter restrictions too about how many folks, engineers and mechanics, can work on the car.
The Toyota identity is a very Japanese setup which clashes with a western mindset. It is like a video game with different levels. Kamui Kobayashi of course is the team principal. Kamui Kobayashi brings a driver's perspective, and the garage might be looking neater. Toyota 1-2. Fortune changes all the time for team cars. Bruni, half a minute up on Pier Guidi in GTE Pro. Mechanics are on one team with their own dedicated car. Toyota needs both cars to finish 1-2. Everybody knows and has specific jobs they need to do. Data and setups are shared for the most part. This is so different in sports car racing, from Formula 1. It is much more of a team deal at Toyota. Individual car crews can get competitive depending on the manufacturer.
There is a rules of engagement system. The fight between the car crews can be intense. When Jose crashed at Sebring, that was a few laps after his wave by. Fair is fair they can race each other but it depends on how the driver behaves. Algarve Pro LMP2 #45 off the road, James Allen from Australia at the wheel of it. Gianmaria Bruni leads GTE Pro after the #51 Ferrari had a puncture. Yellow flags briefly, but gravel all over the place once more. Ryo Hirakawa, the young protege, and the veteran, Kamui Kobayashi. Kazuki Nakajima also helps but Ryo Hirawaka is an older driver, he is not a young whippersnapper by any means.
Next year of course, we are going to see more manufacturers, and of course, when Toyota came in to ace against Audi, they came in at a high level. Kamui Kobayashi is told to check a mode for the hybrid recovery and/or boost as Algarve Pro are repairing the damage to the nose of the car, putting a new nose on hte car with the quick release latch the with pegs and the Allen key we talked about earlier on. Franck Mailleux has the #709 Glickenhaus in third. Alastair Moffitt does a lot of copywriting and will continue to do that even in retirement from the Toyota team. He has won a communication prize of some kind.
Thanks, Alastair for what you have done at Toyota. Meanwhile, the #709 Glickenhaus has pitted. The two GTE Pro cars leading the class pitted together and we have a right rear puncture on the #51 Ferrari of Alessandro Pier Guidi dropping away from Gianmaria Bruni in the #91 Porsche 911 RSR-19. Cool Racing have to box, with Nicklas Kruetten at the controls, putting the car on the dollies for repairs as TDS Racing by Vaillante moves to fourth with Tijmen van der Helm at the wheel of it. Jota lead Prema, their sister car, and TDS, as well as Penske, the top five in LMP2. Welcome Peter Dumbreck to the booth.
Ben Barker and Toni Vilander battle for ninth spot in GTE Am. Ryo Hirakawa leads the motor race a lap up on the sister #7 entry. But the race is not over yet. We have a European Le Mans Series race plus five minutes. Do not count ye olde chickens yet. The #99 Hardpoint Porsche hits the lane with a lockup. Julien Andlauer takes the car over after a pit stop. Ben Keating leading GTE Am in the #33 TF Sport Aston Martin. Each time he has raced here before it was with a different brand of car. Now, AF Corse said that they had a right rear tire puncture and that's the onlu tire they ended up canging as we watch Julien Andlauer being hounded by Harry Tincknell.
Hardpoint drop down a place. The comes one of the other GTE Am Aston's I believe. Both Corvette's of course are out of the motor race as we explained earlier. Ben Keating and Paul Dalla Lana re pressing on and so are Julien Andlauer and Harry Tincknell. This is a real scrap in GTE Am for sure. An experienced Am is Paul Dalla Lana, being very careful with track limits after he had to cop a drive through penalty earlier in the motor race. Looking at Christian Ried next up, competing every time the WEC has raced in over a decade.
Paul Dalla Lana had a great association with a couple of his co-drivers who no longer race in WEC and have retired I am pretty sure. Pedro Lamy and Matthias Lauda.
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