Could this race get any more dramatic? Two hours remained and the 23rd hour began with the sight of the second-placed Porsche 919 crawling round the circuit. Webber managed to get the car home after a lap of 7:45, but it went straight into the garage. Lotterer pulled away into clear air and Di Grassi closed on the stationary Porsche.
But while attention was focussed on the race lead, the battle for LMP2 had closed right up and the top three were covered by just five seconds after 326 laps! Alex Brundle was unable to respond in the hampered G-Drive Ligier and it was the Thiriet version of the new coupé driven by Tristan Gommendy that took the lead on Lap 237 before pitting on the same lap. Harry Tincknell thus led the class for Jota for the first time in the race in the #38 Jota Sport Zytek, but would have to pit soon afterwards. The G-Drive car, meanwhile, also went into the garage.
And if all that wasn’t enough, the long-time leader of the GTE-Am class also hit trouble as Kristian Poulsen ground to a halt in the #95 ‘Dane Train’ Aston. He managed to restart and the car continued, but was this a portent of further trouble?
With 100 minutes of the race remaining, time was called on the #20 Porsche. This had been a magnificent effort in the car’s first year, but it wasn’t to be. We thus had an Audi one-two, with the #8 Toyota of Anthony Davidson now third, the #14 Porsche of Marc Lieb fourth and the #12 Rebellion of Nico Prost fifth.
The LMP2 lead had widened to 32 seconds as a result of Gommendy taking only fuel, but with Tincknell handing the Jota Zytek over to Oliver Turvey with a full service.
After the heartache of seeing the #20 exit stage left, there was more trauma for Porsche as Lieb brought the #14 P1 in after two slow laps. The car was straight into the garage and body language suggested that it was in big trouble.
With 80 minutes to go, we had a change for second as Fred Mako pitted the #92 Porsche after a cross-country excursion. Antonio Garcia had closed to within 10 seconds in the #73 Corvette by this point and celebrated his promotion with a new fastest lap – 3:53.869. Fisichella still had a lead of around two laps though.
With just over an hour to go, Tom Kristensen climbed aboard the #1 Audi for presumably the run to the finish. Three laps and one place separated the Dane from his tenth victory, but that was now looking very unlikely.
As the final hour approached, it looked like the leaders of LMP1, GTE-Pro and GTE-Am were safe, barring mechanical intervention, while the LMP2 fight could still be decided on the track.
MH
