Porsche Penske #6, the 963, and Nicklas Nielsen in the #50 AF Corse Ferrari are behind the race leading #8 Toyota. 11 cars now on the lead lap. We are forecasting more rain at noon and forecasting what the remaining eight hours of the race will bring, the final third of the race. We have done a reset by now. You don't run a 24-hour test at safety car speed. Maybe system errors will turn up. The cars will feel totally different after being cooled down for the last four hours. Ryo Hirakawa is being told to maybe move forward on brake bias. 15 degrees Celsius is the track temperature. Adjust your brake bias based on the hybrid system and so on. We are set now to go to green flag conditions.
We won't have such a challenging restart now but don't crack under pressure. Safety cars breed safety cars. Be on your best behavior but go on full, maximum attack. Car #19, please close the gap. The safety car will speed up to 120 kilometers per hour. Ryo Hirakawa leads Hypercar, Ben Barnicoat leads LMP2, and Klaus Bachler leads GT3. Roger Penske, in his decorated career, he has never won the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Cars that wish to do so can follow the safety car into the pit lane on this green flag. Track is green. Safety car to the pit lane. Green flag and away we go!
Two Toyota's, a Porsche, and a Ferrari, will be racing each other in Hypercar after four hours of Full Course Yellow! We are back at it! Everyone trying to apply the power, all over the road. Nyck de Vries would like to pass the Ferrari. There are rooster tails. You need the airflow and the heated windscreen to clear it. The Toyota's windscreen is very fogged up. Drive through penalty for Full Course Yellow speed for the #3 Cadillac and the #63 Lamborghini. Sebastien Bourdais as well as one of the two Lamborghini's and I don't know who is driving. It is only the spray irritating Nyck de Vries. Nyck de Vries is looking for water or looking for a place to go and has to get out of the way. Robert Kubica has moved up.
de Vries has oil or something else, detritus, all over the the screen. Pnealties cycling through. There goes the tearoff and the team fueled the car but he is dropping like a stone. You put a layer of tearoffs on the windscreen to keep it from getting dirty and pitting all over. A dlux of cars are coming in for penalties for such infractions as passi g under the safety car. Nyck de Vries told to turn on the windscreen heater on the Toyota. The leading #8 Toyota is now being chased by the #6 Porsche. Drive through penalty for Full Course Yellow speed infringement, for Antonio Giovinazzi.
Rain is to be expected at noon. That will be in about three hours. 200 laps now completed by the leading #8 Toyota. Nyck de Vries dropping down as the #37 Cool Racing Oreca of Malthe Jakobsen passes the #22 United Autosport entry. Ben Barnicoat the leader in LMP2 as the #63 Lamborghini is in the lane. AF Corse leads LMP2 by 19.7 seconds after the safety car. Still too early for slick tires and it is not ideal to put new wets on with a drying track to come. Jean Eric Vergne still pressing on in the #93 Peugeot 9X8.
Modern race cars are so complex. You need a brilliant engineer with the supercars like the Hypercars and the GT3's as the Proton Porsche passes the Peugeot into Karting corner. Jean Eric Vergne coming into the pit lane. Last year's winner, Antonio Giovinazzi has served his penalty. Alessandro Pier Guidi is next up. Driver change, to Nico Muller in the #93 Peugeot. Peugeot got their third and most recent win here at Le Mans back in 2009. Hirakawa is two and a half seconds ahead of the Porsche #6 and should not use the wiper. Manthey Pure Racing with Klaus Bachler in the garage in ninth spot in GT3. As a driver you do not have a feel for others' lap times behind you unless your crew chief tells you what the scoop is.
Hirakawa told not to use the wiper because it will smear the tear offs. Laurens Vanthoor is shadowing Ryo Hirakawa and now, Alex Lynn is shadowing the top two in the #2 Cadillac. Matt Campbell has seventh in the #5 Porsche 963, the second Penske car of their three entries in the race. Right now, Jenson Button is being chased by Matt Campbell. Privateer Porsche 963 vs. factory Porsche 963. The Ferrari's are tiptoeing not enjoying the rainy, wet conditions at all. Ben Barnicoat leads LMP2 and Richard Lietz is now in the GT3 lead. Thank you, Tom Kristensen for your contribution. Hello, Oliver Webb as we are racing again.
Matty Campbell makes an efficient move on a drying track. Nothing in it between the #8 Toyota and the #6 Porsche and Jenson Button understands discretion is the better part of valor with seven and a half hours remaining on the board. Alex Quinn now at the wheel of the #14 AO by TF "Spike" the dragon Oreca LMP2. The gap is 2.8 seconds between Hirakawa and Vanthoor. Ferrari #50 in third place is not a happy bunny currently. In LMP2, Ben Barnicoat is leading by 17 seconds trading best laps with the Cool Racing car of Malthe Jakobsen. Tires are a good subject as pit stops are coming. The Ferrari is struggling on wets.
Whoever goes onto a slick tire and can make it work will reap the rewards. Push on to the finish in the next seven hours and 20 minutes. Antonio Giovinazzi absolutely hops over the curbs! I think he was using his joker lap for track limits while the engineer wonders, "oh, bloody hell! What did we break this time?" The Hypercars are very flat, very stiff, and very low to the ground. It is daylight on Sunday morning, but the line is greasy, the supposed preferred line. It won't be preferred until it is dry. Pulling offline to overtake is very risky. 54 of the 62 starters are still in this race with almost 17 hours completed. There is spray between the trees in one section of the circuit. No dry line out of Arnage and blue sky appearing on the frontstretch it appears. Risk it and go onto slicks. Toyota #8 in the pit lane now.
A windscreen tear off. Older tarmac is better for the rain because the air and water seep through the old stone, the old aggregate. We have dryer tarmac with new asphalt. A heat gun, or hair dryer is drying out the rear wing on the #38 Jota Porsche 963. Still in 12th place, the #311 Action Express Cadillac now has Pipo Derani at the controls. No tires laid out for some of the cars and new wets. No slick tires. Antonio Giovinazzi in the #51 Ferrari 499P, and now, Robert Kubica pulling out 30 seconds per lap in the #83 AF Corse Ferrari. New wet Goodyear's onto the #183 AF Corse LMP2 car. Porsche #6 is in as well. The good thing for those who have pitted, they can get a read on others who come in later.
A dryer line on the racing lne is beginning to form. A tear off removed from Ferrari #50's windscreen as the car is refueled and now the #2 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac is in as well and we have also just seen the #50 or #51 Ferrari as Ryo Hirakawa has taken over the lead of the motor race with 207 laps now completed. The sun has come up and we are seeing patches of blue sky. Hirakawa leads Vanthoor by 2.7 seconds. The opposition are on a similar strategy. The tires will be too cold, and the tread blocks heat up and move quicker and then they start melting. The wind will pick up and the dry line will come up quickly.
Still on wets, the #34 Inter Europol LMP2 car. Michelle Gatting has the wheel of the second place GT3 running #85 Iron Dames Lamborghini. Ryo Hirakawa now has a 1.6 second gap ver the rest of the field. Cadillac #3 running in third place. We have the sun out for the first time in a few hours. Toyota has to drive out on the clag, offline. The windscreen wiper is not really necessary as the track dries. Nyck de Vries in the sister Toyota is third. Andrea Caldarelli yelling on the radio at Lamborghini that he can't see a blasted thing. He has three more laps. Three laps, Andrea. Hang in there, mate. Alex Lynn is chasing Robert Kubica.
Everyone is double stinting the rain tires, Peter Baron tells Pipo Derani aboard the #311 Whelen Action Express Cadillac. Changing the windscreen tear off is not the end of the world. The smearing on the windscreen is something everyone is going through. It is very much lethal, though. We could yet see more safety cars coming towards the eighteenth hour. Pit stops are coming as Toyota's mechanics are doing calisthenics. 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2. Peter Baron telling Pipo Derani to look for water on the straightaways and keep the tires cool on the #311 Cadillac.
The lead gap is 1.3 seconds now between Toyota #8 and Porsche #6. Now the sun is out.
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