Webber fastest for Porsche in opening Le Mans practice
Porsche draws first blood at Le Mans in the pre-qualifying Le Mans practice.
Photo by: Porsche AG
Mark Webber emerged quickest in free practice at Le Mans this evening setting a time of 3m21.362s, which eclipsed the 2014 pole time. The four hour session was punctuated by several rain showers which broke up the leading team critical evaluation of slick rubber over full stints.
Audi trails Porsche
The No.17 Porsche 919 Hybrid headed the way, leading the No.8 Audi by just over half a second. Romain Dumas in the No.18 Porsche had initially made it a Porsche 1-2-3 and had also beaten last year's pole-position time but had his quickest time deleted at the end of the session after he cut a chicane while overtaking a Ferrari GTE car. This ensured there next best time was only good enough for third overall.
The No.19 Porsche driven by Nick Tandy placed fourth fastest. The British racer who is making his LMP Le Mans debut took over the car from Kiwi, Earl Bamber who had earlier skidded in to the first Mulsanne Chicane gravel trap. Bamber was towed out under a Slow Zone caution and returned to the pits with a largely undamaged car.
The best Toyota was the defending WEC champion car driven by Anthony Davidson, Sebastien Buemi and Kazuki Nakajima. The TS 040 though was just over 3.5 seconds away from the ultimate pace.
The much heralded Nissan GT-R LM NISMOs finished 12th, 13th and 14th overall and behind the leading LMP2 entry of the KCMG team. The No.21 Nissan, in the popular retro 1990 livery, saw Studio Matsuda head his team mates.
KCMG tops LMP2
Richard Bradley set the best LMP2 time for the Hong Kong entered KCMG Oreca-Nissan. The Asian based British driver set a best of 3m39.897s in the electric blue LMP2 coupe despite the car causing the first of two red flags when it stopped with a water pressure problem in the first five minutes of the session.
A last ditch effort from Spa and Nurburgring 24 Hour winner - Laurens Vanthoor made sure the OAK Racing entered and Honda-powered Ligier JS P2 claimed second place in class ahead of the Thiriet by TDS Racing ORECA-Nissan and Greaves Motorsport Gibson 015S.
Aston heads GTE classes
Aston Martin Racing easily headed both of the LMGTE classes this evening.
A succession of fast laps from GP2 racer Richie Stanaway saw the Kiwi peak on a 3m55.895s to put the No.99 Aston Martin Vantage over 1.5s clear of the No.64 Chevrolet Corvette C7.R.
Pedro Lamy’s 3m58.783s in the GTE Am Aston was clearly the fastest in the LMGTE Am class tonight. The ex Lotus and Minardi F1 racer was almost three seconds faster than the Dempsey-Proton Racing Porsche 911 RSR driven by Patrick Long.
The first qualifying session gets underway at 22.00 local time.
Practice results
Cla | No. | Driver | Car / Engine | Time | Delay | Laps | km/h |
1 | 17 | Timo Bernhard Mark Webber Brendon Hartley |
Porsche | 3'21.362 | 39 | 243.662 | |
2 | 8 | Lucas di Grassi Loïc Duval Oliver Jarvis |
Audi | 3'21.950 | 0.588 | 47 | 242.953 |
3 | 18 | Romain Dumas Neel Jani Marc Lieb |
Porsche | 3'22.059 | 0.697 | 43 | 242.822 |
4 | 19 | Nico Hülkenberg Earl Bamber Nick Tandy |
Porsche | 3'22.819 | 1.457 | 24 | 241.912 |
5 | 7 | Marcel Fässler André Lotterer Benoît Tréluyer |
Audi | 3'23.051 | 1.689 | 49 | 241.635 |
6 | 9 | F.Albuquerque Marco Bonanomi René Rast |
Audi | 3'23.480 | 2.118 | 46 | 241.126 |
7 | 1 | Anthony Davidson Sébastien Buemi Kazuki Nakajima |
Toyota | 3'24.763 | 3.401 | 41 | 239.615 |
8 | 2 | Alexander Wurz S.Sarrazin Mike Conway |
Toyota | 3'25.537 | 4.175 | 37 | 238.713 |
9 | 12 | Nicolas Prost Mathias Beche Nick Heidfeld |
Rebellion/AER | 3'28.441 | 7.079 | 36 | 235.387 |
10 | 13 | A.Imperatori D.Kraihamer Daniel Abt |
Rebellion/AER | 3'33.176 | 11.814 | 36 | 230.159 |
11 | 47 | Matt Howson Richard Bradley Nicolas Lapierre |
ORECA/Nissan | 3'39.897 | 18.535 | 17 | 223.124 |
12 | 21 | Tsugio Matsuda M.Shulzhitskiy Lucas Ordóñez |
Nissan | 3'40.332 | 18.970 | 19 | 222.683 |
13 | 23 | Olivier Pla J.Mardenborough Max Chilton |
Nissan | 3'40.429 | 19.067 | 16 | 222.585 |
14 | 22 | Harry Tincknell Michael Krumm Alex Buncombe |
Nissan | 3'41.302 | 19.940 | 19 | 221.707 |
15 | 34 | Chris Cumming Laurens Vanthoor Kévin Estre |
Ligier/HPD | 3'41.311 | 19.949 | 34 | 221.698 |
16 | 46 | Pierre Thiriet Tristan Gommendy Ludovic Badey |
ORECA/Nissan | 3'41.742 | 20.380 | 35 | 221.267 |
17 | 41 | Gary Hirsch Gaëtan Paletou Jon Lancaster |
Gibson/Nissan | 3'42.163 | 20.801 | 34 | 220.848 |
18 | 26 | Roman Rusinov Julien Canal Sam Bird |
Ligier/Nissan | 3'42.641 | 21.279 | 24 | 220.374 |
19 | 30 | Scott Sharp Ryan Dalziel David Hansson |
Ligier/HPD | 3'43.344 | 21.982 | 24 | 219.680 |
20 | 42 | Nick Leventis Danny Watts Jonny Kane |
Dome/Nissan | 3'43.948 | 22.586 | 25 | 219.088 |
21 | 29 | Leo Roussel David Cheng Ho-Pin Tung |
Morgan/Nissan | 3'43.990 | 22.628 | 25 | 219.047 |
22 | 37 | Mikhail Aleshin Kirill Ladygin Anton Ladygin |
BR Engineering/Nissan | 3'44.482 | 23.120 | 27 | 218.567 |
23 | 43 | Pierre Ragues Oliver Webb Zoel Amberg |
Morgan/SARD | 3'44.767 | 23.405 | 34 | 218.290 |
24 | 28 | Gustavo Yacamán Luis Derani Ricardo González |
Ligier/Nissan | 3'44.794 | 23.432 | 31 | 218.263 |
25 | 36 | N.Panciatici Paul-Loup Chatin V.Capillaire |
Alpine/Nissan | 3'44.807 | 23.445 | 17 | 218.251 |
26 | 27 | Maurizio Mediani Devi Markozov N.Minassian |
BR Engineering/Nissan | 3'45.233 | 23.871 | 28 | 217.838 |
27 | 38 | Simon Dolan Mitchell Evans Oliver Turvey |
Gibson/Nissan | 3'45.291 | 23.929 | 33 | 217.782 |
28 | 4 | Simon Trummer Pierre Kaffer Tiago Monteiro |
CLM/AER | 3'45.873 | 24.511 | 21 | 217.221 |
29 | 45 | Pierre Perret Ivan Bellarosa José Ibanez |
ORECA/Nissan | 3'47.893 | 26.531 | 28 | 215.295 |
30 | 31 | Ed Brown J.van Overbeek Jon Fogarty |
Ligier/HPD | 3'48.150 | 26.788 | 25 | 215.053 |
31 | 40 | Tracy Krohn Nic Jönsson João Barbosa |
Ligier/Judd | 3'48.840 | 27.478 | 34 | 214.404 |
32 | 48 | Karun Chandhok Mark Patterson N.Berthon |
ORECA/Nissan | 3'49.427 | 28.065 | 12 | 213.856 |
33 | 35 | Jacques Nicolet Jean-Marc Merlin Erik Maris |
Ligier/HPD | 3'52.979 | 31.617 | 26 | 210.595 |
34 | 99 | Fernando Rees Alex MacDowall Richie Stanaway |
Aston Martin | 3'55.895 | 34.533 | 35 | 207.992 |
35 | 64 | Oliver Gavin Tommy Milner Jordan Taylor |
Chevrolet | 3'57.539 | 36.177 | 24 | 206.553 |
36 | 97 | Darren Turner Stefan Mücke Rob Bell |
Aston Martin | 3'58.448 | 37.086 | 28 | 205.765 |
37 | 92 | Patrick Pilet F.Makowiecki Wolf Henzler |
Porsche | 3'58.469 | 37.107 | 27 | 205.747 |
38 | 63 | Jan Magnussen Antonio García Ryan Briscoe |
Chevrolet | 3'58.501 | 37.139 | 25 | 205.719 |
39 | 98 | Paul Dalla Lana Pedro Lamy Mathias Lauda |
Aston Martin | 3'58.783 | 37.421 | 29 | 205.476 |
40 | 71 | Davide Rigon James Calado Olivier Beretta |
Ferrari | 3'59.653 | 38.291 | 26 | 204.731 |
41 | 91 | Richard Lietz M.Christensen Jörg Bergmeister |
Porsche | 3'59.892 | 38.530 | 21 | 204.527 |
42 | 95 | Marco Sørensen C.Nygaard Nicki Thiim |
Aston Martin | 4'00.034 | 38.672 | 21 | 204.406 |
43 | 51 | Gianmaria Bruni Toni Vilander G.Fisichella |
Ferrari | 4'00.082 | 38.720 | 28 | 204.365 |
44 | 77 | Patrick Dempsey Patrick Long Marco Seefried |
Porsche | 4'01.611 | 40.249 | 30 | 203.071 |
45 | 88 | Christian Ried K.Al Qubaisi Klaus Bachler |
Porsche | 4'02.029 | 40.667 | 25 | 202.721 |
46 | 50 | Gianluca Roda Paolo Ruberti Kristian Poulsen |
Chevrolet | 4'02.332 | 40.970 | 21 | 202.467 |
47 | 83 | François Perrodo Emmanuel Collard Rui Águas |
Ferrari | 4'02.637 | 41.275 | 26 | 202.213 |
48 | 53 | J.Bleekemolen Ben Keating Marc Miller |
SRT/Dodge | 4'03.287 | 41.925 | 12 | 201.672 |
49 | 62 | Bill Sweedler Townsend Bell Jeff Segal |
Ferrari | 4'03.799 | 42.437 | 28 | 201.249 |
50 | 61 | Peter Mann R.Giammaria Matteo Cressoni |
Ferrari | 4'03.840 | 42.478 | 25 | 201.215 |
51 | 66 | A.Al Faisal Kuba Giermaziak Michael Avenatti |
Ferrari | 4'04.367 | 43.005 | 25 | 200.781 |
52 | 72 | Viktor Shaitar Andrea Bertolini Aleksey Basov |
Ferrari | 4'05.137 | 43.775 | 21 | 200.150 |
53 | 55 | Duncan Cameron Matt Griffin Alex Mortimer |
Ferrari | 4'05.319 | 43.957 | 27 | 200.002 |
54 | 96 | Roald Goethe Stuart Hall F.Castellacci |
Aston Martin | 4'05.550 | 44.188 | 26 | 199.814 |
55 | 67 | Jun San Chen Alex Kapadia Xavier Maassen |
Porsche | 4'05.787 | 44.425 | 29 | 199.621 |
56 | 68 | Han Chen Chen Gilles Vannelet Mike Parisy |
Porsche | 4'06.704 | 45.342 | 21 | 198.879 |
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