ge5388664516126109677
ge5018472845279976597
ge5328265114359528995
ge5239628820700093564
ge4637576945783286968
Geoffrey Harris12 Jun 2015
NEWS

MOTORSPORT: Webber one-out at Le Mans

He's on front row as Porsches dominate qualifying, but Briscoe's Chevrolet Corvette non-starter after crash

The 1000-horsepower Porsche 919 Hybrid that Mark Webber is driving at Le Mans will start the 24-Hour race  from the front row tomorrow (Saturday) night, but he's now the only Australian in the event.

The Chevrolet Corvette C7.R that Ryan Briscoe was to race was damaged beyond repair in qualifying.

Germany has outpointed Japan in the class one prototype sports cars, with Porsche's three 919s filling the first three places on the grid ahead of the three Audi R18 e-tron quattros.

The lap record that Swiss driver Neel Jani set in Wednesday night's first qualifying session – 3 minutes 16.887 seconds for the 13.63km La Sarthe circuit – was not bettered in either of Thursday night's sessions.

German veteran Timo Bernhard's time in the Porsche he is sharing with Webber and young New Zealander Brendon Hartley that put that car on the front row was 0.88 seconds slower – 3:17.767, also clocked on Wednesday and also below Peugeot's 2008 pole record of 3:18.513.

Moves are afoot to curb speeds at Le Mans next year, while the field is to expand from 56 to 60 cars.

Even though Porsche has comprehensively outpaced Audi and Japanese rivals Toyota and Nissan this time, Webber said "we didn't push too much for qualifying".

"Here in Le Mans it is not so important to start from pole position," Webber said.

"We focused on [preparing for] the race, because that's what matters.

"Qualifying was the first time that we had run properly in the night with dry conditions, so all the drivers were able to get a feeling for the track and the car.

"The biggest challenge you have to fight at Le Mans is the race itself.

"We have to survive 24 hours, we have to be technically reliable and get everything right.

"It is extremely demanding. The track is incredibly quick and the pace of the 919 is phenomenal.

"There are different phases of the race and the changing light; sunset, twilight, racing in the dark before dawn, sunrise and a new day with still a long way to go.

"Le Mans is like nothing else."

The third Porsche in the race has an entirely rookie line-up, headed by German F1 driver Nico Hulkenberg with New Zealander Earl Bamber and Brit Nick Tandy.

Porsche is in its second year back in the top level of sports car racing, chasing a 17th Le Mans 24-Hour victory after a record 16 wins last century before a 16-year layoff.

Its Volkswagen group stablemate Audi has triumphed 13 times in the past 15 years and, despite not having the single-lap speed of Porsche, remains favourite for the race starting at midnight Saturday, eastern Australian time, because of the renowned relentless reliability of its diesel hybrids.

The fastest of the Audis was almost 3 seconds slower than the pole time of the Porsche that Jani is sharing with Frenchman Romain Dumas and German Marc Lieb, while Toyota's two TS040 Hybrids were even further away, qualifying seventh and eighth.

The faster of the Toyotas was 2.5 seconds behind the slowest Audi and 6.656 seconds off the pole position.

The radical front-engined, front-wheel-drive Nissan LM GT-R NISMOs will start 12th, 13th and 15th, all more than 20 seconds off pole and behind the three privateer LMP1 cars – Switzerland's pair of debuting Rebellion R-One AERs and Austria's sole ByKolles CLM P01/AER, which improved by 3.3 seconds last night to be 11th.

One of the British drivers in the fastest Nissan, Alex Buncombe, today has been confirmed to partner Todd Kelly in an Altima again for the V8 Supercar endurance rounds in Australia in September-October. That pair were seventh in last year’s Bathurst 1000, making Buncombe the top debutant, but he withdrew from the line-up in Nissan’s ultimately victorious Bathurst 12-Hour GT-R in February because of the arrival of his first child.

Danish ex-Formula One driver Jan Magnussen crashed the GTE Pro-class Corvette he had been sharing at Le Mans with Briscoe and Spaniard Antonio Garcia exiting the Porsche Curves.

A mechanical failure sent the Corvette into a wall, then it spun across the track into another barrier on the other side.

Magnussen's son Kevin, who raced in F1 last season for McLaren but has been "benched" this year with Fernando Alonso joining Jenson Button in that team, posted on social media that "Dad is ok. Car took a big hit though, but the @CorvetteRacing guys are awesome so fingers crossed they can fix it! #hopeful".

However, Chevrolet Racing director Mark Kent has since announced that the car can't be repaired in time, denying Briscoe and the other pair a chance to repeat their class successes in this year's Daytona 12-Hour and Sebring 12-Hour in America.

The first of Thursday's Le Mans qualifying sessions was red-flagged half an hour early after Magnussen's crash, with time added to the final session, which was then interrupted when a Porsche 911 caught fire on the Mulsanne Straight.

An Aston Martin Vantage driven by New Zealander Richie Stanaway qualified fastest in GTE Pro, 0.1 seconds ahead of a Ferrari 458 driven by Italian Gianmaria Bruni.

The LMP2 pole went to an Oreca 05 Nissan at 3:38.032 – faster than two of Nissan's LMP1 cars.

Audi's technical director Ralf Juttner has called for "a sophisticated approach" to reducing the speeds of the LMP1 cars next year.

"To reduce the lap time you can reduce the power, but if you do that only to the LMP1s you create a big problem for our cars with the GTs and the P2 cars," Juttner said.

"We're concentrating [hard] in the corners already now [because of the speed differentials between categories] and it will be even worse if they take power from us to reduce the lap time.

"We are actually slower now on the straights [largely as a result of fuel consumption initiatives] than we have been a few years ago.

"All of the speed we've gained has been in the corners. So if you have to address it, that's where you have to look at.

"On the other hand, this [LMP1] is not the class of race cars you want to reduce aero[dynamics] because we're having a very good time in sports car racing at the moment because of the way the rules are and the possibility for innovations.

"For me, it has to stay like this."

Toyota technical chief Pascal Vasselon said the most likely solution would come from a further reduction in fuel flows, but that would not necessarily address the issue of the increased cornering speeds.

"We have one obvious parameter, which is fuel energy/flow because that's something that we [sports car racing] wanted to reduce," Vasselon said.

"If we need to drop the performance further, the first parameter to be considered is the fuel.

"Then it depends on how much you need to drop performance, as it may not be enough.

"You can increase weight, implementing more severe aero restrictions to make sure the aero performance reduces.

"You can do something for all of them but the very first one is to keep reducing the fuel amount."

Share this article
Written byGeoffrey Harris
See all articles
Our team of independent expert car reviewers and journalistsMeet the team
Stay up to dateBecome a carsales member and get the latest news, reviews and advice straight to your inbox.
Download the carsales app
    AppStoreDownloadGooglePlayDownload
    App Store and the Apple logo are trademarks of Apple Inc. Google Play and the Google Play logo are trademarks of Google LLC.
    © CAR Group Ltd 1999-2024
    In the spirit of reconciliation we acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.