Monday Morning Session
The first four-hour session saw track conditions slippery after overnight rain but the track drying pretty rapidly.
There were a number of stoppage in the session, the first for the #13 Inter Europol Ligier, in the hands of Julien Falchero, stopped on track, the car restarting and returning to the pits under its own power, the second for the #84 SRT 41 Oreca, the car suffering some damage in the hands of Takuma Aoki and missing the remainder of the session, the third for the second Inter Europol Ligier, in the gravel at T10 and the final stoppage for an incident involving the #11 EuroInternational Ligier LMP3.
38 of the 42 cars entered for the test took to the track for the first session with the #24, 25, and 35 LMP2 cars, and the #88 GTE Ferrari not appearing for the session. In fact, all four not seeing action on day one at all.
Comparison of times to last year aren’t directly applicable with the significant re-profiling of Turn 10 since the 2020 ELMS race.
LMP2 saw the times coming down throughout the session, top of the times at the checkered flag would be the #32 United Autosports Oreca in the hands of Job van Uitert, a 1:34.830 a full second faster than Patrick Pilet’s best effort in the #28 IDEC Sport car – Pilet had led the session earlier on as had Ricky Taylor (#21 DragonSpeed) and Charlie Eastwood (#34 Racing Team Turkey), indeed the #34 would end the session as fastest car in the new LMP2 Pro-Am class, though by then Harry Tincknell had posted a faster time than Eastwood with a 1:35.901.
LMP3 was headed by the #11 EuroInternational Ligier with Joey Alders another class leader with a substantial gap, his 1:40.765 just under a full half second clear of David Droux in the #8 Graff and Malthe Jakobsen in the #15 RLR MSport Ligier.
Iron Lynx took a 1,2 in GTE class after 4 hours, Miguel Molina scorching round in a 1:43.789 in the #60 Ferrari, 1.2 seconds clear of Michelle Getting in the sister #83 machine.
David Perel was next up in the #55 Spirit of Race Ferrari with Felipe Laser the fastest of the Porsche runners in fourth.
Monday Afternoon Session
The four-hour afternoon session saw uninterrupted bright but cloudy skies but still sub 20-degree weather.
It was another session interrupted by several stoppages, a pair, back to back coming out after a couple of woes for the #34 Racing Team Turkey Oreca when in the hands of Harry Tincknell, no visible damage though in either incident.
Pietro Fittipaldi set the fastest time in the session, the Brazilian one of a number of the G-Drive and APR drivers cycling through in the #26 car, Fittipaldi’s 1:34.694 a tenth and a half faster than Ricky Taylor in the #21 DragonSpeed car with Job van Uitert (#32 United), Nico Lapierre (#37 COOL Racing), and Harry Tincknell (#34 Racing Team Turkey) all within half a tenth of each other.
In LMP3, reigning champion Wayne Boyd topped the times for the session with a lap in 1:40.231 in the #2United Ligier, new EuroInternational signing Joey Alders was half a second back in the #11 Ligier with Garett Grist (#20 Team Virage) and Malthe Jakobsen (15 RLR MSport) next up.
GTE saw an Iron Lynx clean sweep of the top three with Miguel Molina again fastest in the #80 Ferrari (1:43.789), again a full second faster than the next quickest, this time Paulo Ruberti in the #60 car with Michelle Getting third fastest in the Iron Dames #83.
Monday Evening Session
Described as a night session, the two-hour run from 19:00 to 21:00 saw little or no real night running, and relatively few of the runners, just 16 cars, completed flying laps during the session with none of the GTE runners logging a flying lap.
The session though would see the fastest laps of the day emerging with Louis Deletraz topping the times in the #41 team WRT Oreca, his best of a 1:33.173 bettering the efforts set in the earlier sessions.
Also quick, and also in the same car was Robert Kubica, a 1:34.829 significantly faster in the session than the third quickest car, the #26 Aurus 01.
LMP3 also saw half their field out on track in the session, and also saw the fastest times of the day, this time for Laurents Hörr in the #4 DKR Engineering Duqueine, the German the first driver in the class under 1:40 (1:39.541).
Tuesday Morning Session
Phil Hanson got Tuesday off to a flying start, topping the times in the #22 United Autosports Oreca with a 1:33.322 that would prove to be the second-fastest of the test days as a whole.
Also into the 1:33s and just a tenth off the United man was the #37 COOL Racing car of Nico Lapierre, his 1:33.494 would be the fastest of the test for an LMP2 Pro-Am entered car.
LMP3 saw Laurents Hörr top the Tims both for the session and the test proper in the #4 Duqueine of DKR Engineering heading the #3 Inter Europol. #2 United and #20 Team Virage Ligier in the four-hour session.
GTE saw Gimmi Bruni top the times in the #77 Proton Porsche, the first time in the tests that a 911 had been fastest.
Rachel Frey was second quickest in the #83 ‘Iron Dames’ Ferrari with Matt Griffin third quickest in the #55 Spirit of Race 488.
Tuesday Afternoon Session
Ben Hanley topped the times in the final three-hour session of the day (1:33.682) giving DragonSpeed a headline for their #21 Oreca and completing a run that saw different cars top every session in LMP2.
Behind Hanley came Patrick Pilet (#28 IDEC Sport), Matthieu Lahaye (#29 Ultimate), and Will Stevens (#65 Panis Racing) though all three were a full second shy of the session-topping lap.
Laurents Hörr topped a second consecutive session in LMP3 in the #4 DKR Duqueine (1:40.892) ahead of David Droux’s #8 Graff Ligier and MV2S’s Fabien Lavergne.
Alessio Rovera topped the times in the GTE class in the #88 AF Corse Ferrari (1:43.682) that only the team’s new man completed flying laps in, Francois Perrodo completing a sighting lap only in the newly re-liveried car, the team only running on Tuesday and reserving the time to allow Rovera to dial himself in.
He did so with aplomb and headed the #93 Proton Porsche and #80 Iron Lynx Ferrari at the end of the session, the fourth driver, in the fourth car, to head a session in the class.
