Binnie passes LMP2 test of attrition

The LMP2 category had an extremely high attrition rate and eventually became simply a test of survival. The #31 Team Binnie Motorsports Lola-Zytek B05-40 driven by Bill Binnie, Allen Timpany and Chris Buncombe held on to comfortably take the win.

At the start of the race the #40 Quifel - ASM Team Lola-AER B0540 driven by Miguel Amaral, Miguel Angel de Castro and Warren Hughes initially dominated the class with both a strong performance and the gradual disappearance of other challengers.

#33 Barazi Epsilon Zytek 07S/2 Zytek: Adrian Fernandez, Haruki Kurosawa, Robbie Kerr.

Photo by Eric Gilbert.

The #21 Team Bruichladdich Radical AER SR9 of Tim Greaves crashed due to the wet conditions, the #32 Team Barazi Epsilon Zytek 07S/2 of Michael Vergers suffered gear selection problems, the #33 Team Barazi Epsilon Zytek 07S/2 of Haruki Kurosawa suffered a brake problem and the #25 Team RML Ray Mallock Lola-AER B05-40 of Andy Wallace blew a piston.

The LMP2 mechanical gremlins eventually hit the #40 car too when Hughes ground to a halt out on the circuit due to a missing rear wheel caused by a wheel bearing failure. He eventually got back to the pits to undergo lengthy repairs, but had to pit again for further fixes, dropped out of contention and eventually retired.

The #31 Team Binnie Motorsports Lola-Zytek B05-40 Chris Buncombe took over the lead of the category and stayed there. The #24 Noel Del Bello Courage-AER LC75 driven by Vitali Petrov, Elisabeth Halliday and Romain Iannetta looked like it may make a challenge but it suffered a spin, lengthy pitstops, and retired with a broken gearbox.

The next second-placed driver, Karim Ojjeh, had a big accident on the pit straight at the start of the twentieth hour in the #32 Team Barazi Epsilon Zytek 07S/2. The car ran wide at the final corner, spun round and hit the pit wall backwards causing heavy damage to the back of the car.

This left #33 Team Barazi Epsilon Zytek 07S/2 of Adrian Fernandez running in second place and the only other runner still on the track in the LMP2 category.

When the rain started to pour the leading #31 car of Allen Timpany went straight into the garage. The team had an 18-lap lead so could afford the luxury of giving the car a good check over to ensure that everything was okay.