There are two Ferraris in the lead as we reach the end of the second hour at the 24h of Le Mans, which is already providing endless excitement.
After the brief shower of rain that soaked the Circuit de la Sarthe just as the Warm-Up was being carried out, a strong wind allowed the surface to dry for the start of the 92nd edition of the French classic, valid as the second round of the FIA World Endurance Championship.
The clouds continue to be threatening also in view of the next few hours, but at 4.00 pm sharp, on the usual fantastic notes of ‘Thus Spoke Zarathustra’the race got underway and Porsche briefly held the lead of operations in the Hypercar Class.
Nicklas Nielsen and Antonio Giovinazzi, however, took just a few laps to take the lead with the Ferraris #50 and #51, putting the 963 #6 behind them, with the Cadillac #3 threatening using the soft tyres.
Immediate problems for the BMWs: the #15 spun in the ‘Esses’ touching the barriers with the right side, but Dries Vanthoor managed to restart, while René Rast suffered a puncture in his #20 in the second hour and returned to the pits .
In the first round of pit stops, the #51 and #83 Ferraris served the 10″ penalty for the infringement committed in Qualifying, but the most serious error was committed by the #50, which literally cut the line when restarting. road to the oncoming Cadillac #3. This inevitably resulted in a 10″ fine to be served at the second stop.
The Proton Competition Porsche #99 instead carried out an intervention inside the garage before restarting, while a Slow Zone in turn 1 – caused by the spin of Ben Keating’s Oreca #23 – was encountered by the group of leaders, allowing those behind to join back and reopen a good fight at the end of the first hour.
During the second there were great battles for the lead between the Ferrari #50, the Porsche #6 and the Cadillac #3, followed by the 499 #51 and the Toyota #8, armed with soft tires (like the V-Series.R mentioned above).
1h40′ into the race, the first twist with a violent splash of water soaking the area of the ‘Porsche’ curves and the main straight, as well as part of the first sector. The Ferrari #51, Porsche #6 and #4 opted to stop here. Alpine #35, Porsche-Jota #38, Cadillac #3 and #2, Toyota #7 and Alpine #36, with the others continuing on slicks.
#311 Whelen Cadillac Racing Cadillac V-Series.R: Pipo Derani, Jack Aitken, Felipe Drugovich
Photo credit: Rainier Ehrhardt
This gave rise to a nice duel between the 499P #83 (on soft) and #50 for first place, occupied first by the yellow of AF Corse with Robert Kubica at the wheel and followed by the red of Nicklas Nielsen, which however at the end of the race ‘now he responded to the Pole by taking back the leadership.
At around 25″ there are the Porsche #12 of Jota and #5 of Team Penske, ahead of the two Lamborghinis of Iron Lynx, which also remained on the track without stopping and passing in front of the Porsche #6, which has the #38 behind by Jota.
Also in the Top 10 are the Aline #35 and the Cadillac #3, with the #2 dropping to 11th ahead of the BMW #20. Towards the end of the hour a ray of sunshine gave the idea to all those with wet tires that it was better to stop again, so the standings were quite shuffled.
In the LMP2 Class, the Oreca #34 of Inter Europol Competition took the lead, overtaking the Vector Sport #10 and the #37 of Cool Racing and taking off.
Also in the Top5 are United #22 and Idec Sport #28, with AF Corse #183 leading the PRO/AM subcategory.
In the LMGT3 Class, a lot of things changed here too with the arrival of the rain and the Lexus #87 of Akkodis-ASP, with the BMW #46 of Team WRT which Valentino Rossi still has to ride 9″ behind.
Also in the Top5 are the Ford Mustang #77 of Proton and the Ferrari #66 of JMW Motorsport.
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