This hour session was impacted by two track incidents which prevented the contenders from getting a yellow flag free track during nearly 40 minutes.
Both Toyotas were quick out of the gate with Kamui Kobayashi in the #7 lapping in 3.26.279 while team mate Brendon Hartley in the #8 reeled off a 3.27.671. This 1-2 for Toyota was locked until the final 20 minutes of the session when Mathieu Vaxivière clocked a 3.27.095 in the #36 Alpine Elf Matmut Gibson and took second position behind the #7 Toyota.
The two Glickenhaus 007 LMH were never in a position to claim pole position: the best of the two cars – the #708 shared by Pipo Derani, Franck Mailleux and Olivier Pla ended in fourth position, two full seconds behind the pole sitting car (3.28.256). The #709 driven by Ryan Briscoe, Richard Westbrook and Romain Dumas ended in seventh position (3.29.381) behind two LMP2 prototypes.
Meanwhile in LMP2, Antonio Felix Da Costa topped the LMP2 time sheets in the #38 Jota Oreca 07 Gibson (3.28.807), some four tenths ahead of Nick De Vries in the #26 G-Drive Racing Oreca 07 (3.29.246) and six tenths ahead of Louis Deletraz in the #41 Team WRT Oreca 07 Gibson (3.29.441). The #38 and the #26 were less than three seconds slower than the #7 Toyota.
The top six were completed by Louis Deletraz in the debuting Team WRT #41 Oreca, Will Stevens in the #65 Panis Racing car and two of the three United Autosport’s efforts, Nico Jamin in the #32 and Paul di Resta in the #23.
In the LMP2 Pro/Am category, the #70 Real Team Racing Oreca 07 shared by Esteban Garcia, Loic Duval and Norman Nato topped the category’s time sheets after being in contention for qualifying in the top 6 spots overall most of the session. “This is the 24 Hours of Le Mans… Traffic was not on our side tonight” admitted Loic Duval afterwards.
The fastest LMP2 car during Test Day – the #48 IDEC Sport Oreca 07 Gibson – crashed at Tertre Rouge with Paul-Loup Chatin at the wheel. As confirmed by Nicolas Minassian during the session, the car can be repaired. It’s yet another difficult day for the French squad as the sister car, the #17 shared by Dwight Merriman, Thomas Laurent and Ryan Dalziel had its tub changed after suffering significant damages during yesterday’ first free practice session.
Felipe Albuquerque meanwhile was visibly unhappy after losing his best efforts to traffic, the #22 United car missing the Hyperpole cut
GTE Classes – Ferrari 1-2 in Pro, Porsche 1-2 in Am
Showing big improvement from its FP1 times straight out of the gate, the GTE-Pro class lined up what could be a tense Hyperpole shoot out tomorrow. A Ferrari 1-2 for the AF Corse outfit proved the 488 GTE EVO’s ability to deal with pressure, which at this stage could come from anywhere in a typically closely contested entry.
Kevin Estre began Porsche’s challenge, a 3:46.779 a second clear of team mate Gianmaria Bruni’s #91 car. Nick Tandy’s early work in the 3:48’s had the #64 Corvette in third before a Porsche/ Ferrari / Porsche / Ferrari pattern emerged in the first half hour. The question was how fast were the Corvettes able to go?
A 3:46.011 saw Daniel Serra past the #91 Porsche to head the order, the #52 AF Corse Ferrari having been showing particularly well so far during the preceding Free Practice session. The time would stick for P1.
In a frantic final ten minutes, Nick Tandy completed his last lap in 3:47.074 which seemed good enough for third, but was soon bumped by Kevin Estre’s Porsche, and then James Calado’s 3:46.581 for AF Corse to deliver a sturdy Ferrari 1-2.
Hub Auto Racing snatched fifth for Porsche, a tenth better than the #91 factory effort that scraped through in sixth by six hundredths of a second. Missing out on Hyperpole then would be the #79 Weathertec Porsche and the #63 Corvette, Garcia improving its times but still trailing the class by two seconds.
GTE-Am showed depth and pace in a hard-fought scrap for the Hyperpole cut, with Porsches 1st and 2nd in the hunt at the close of a disrupted 1 hour session.
Ben Barker has a habit of setting an early GTE-Am qualifying marker at Le Mans, his 3:49.100 for GR Racing the best of a Porsche 1-2-3-4 before the first full course yellow. Callum Illot’s first run in anger for Iron Lynx put the #80 Ferrari second to spoil the party with a 3:49.693, half a second shy of the class lead, before (Julien Andlauer?) placed the #88 Dempsey Proton Racing 911 RSR-19 at the top of the times with a 3:48.620, where it would stay.
Paul Dalla Lana lost the #98 Aston Martin, digging backwards into the gravel at the Dunlop Esses and throwing a slow zone half way through the session as cars struggled to find a qualifying rhythm, exacerbated by Rahal Frey almost mimicking the move at the same location, a further course caution compressing the available qualifying time into the final 12 minutes…
The churn in GTE-Am gained momentum: Ferrari came into play with a 3:49.462 for Inception Racing, Ben Barnicoat putting the Prancing Horse’s #71 representative third; still not enough to drop GR Racing’s time however, which held on impressively in second place to the end.
After its earlier FP1 accident damage the Cetilar Ferrari was a runner. Antonio Fuoco had a huge excursion before recovering enough pace to assume third with a fabulous 3:49.102, just two-thousandths off Ben Barker’s second place time, but displacing the Inception Racing lap time to fourth.
Team Project 1 had been strong in FP1, but at 3:49.608 could only manage fifth place, enough though for a second shot in tomorrow’s Hyperpole session.
