The sun is setting beautifully over Circuit de la Sarthe, and there are 18 hours left in the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Now through the first quarter of the 93rd edition, the #50 Ferrari AF Corse 499P leads overall and has completed 92 laps. Miguel Molina heads a Ferrari 1-2-3 at the front by about three seconds seconds over the #83 AF Corse Ferrari of Ye Yifei.
Ye just inherited the position from the #51 factory Ferrari of Alessandro Pier Guidi that came in for a pit stop right at the top of the hour. The #83 and #6 Porsche Penske Motorsport 963 are a little further into their stints, and Porsche’s Matt Campbell currently third on the road ahead of Pier Guidi.
But make no mistake, this race is currently in a Ferrari stronghold up front.
The #20 Team WRT BMW M Hybrid V8 of Sheldon van der Linde rounds out the top five, ahead of the #8 Toyota GR010 HYBRID of Ryo Hirakawa, the #12 Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA V-Series.R of Norman Nato, and the #94 Peugeot TotalEnergies 9X8 of Loic Duval – which is still pursuing its long-run strategy – in eighth.
Despite its retro good looks, the #7 Toyota Gazoo Racing GR010 HYBRID has had a low profile in this race. Running in the midfield it’s situation deteriorated half way through the hour as the car was handed a 50 second stop/go penalty for pit lane speeding, dropping the car further out of contention.
Remarkably, however, it is one of the 16 of the 21 Hypercars still on the lead lap at this stage.
Right now, it’s the #48 VDS Panis Racing ORECA that leads LMP2 with Oliver Gray aboard.
The #199 AO by TF ‘Spike’ ORECA runs second of all LMP2 cars and leads the LMP2 Pro/Am sub-class, after their star man Louis Deletraz overtook the #9 Iron Lynx-Proton car of Reshad de Gerus for position.
The complexion of LMP2 changed after the #43 Inter Europol Competition ORECA 07-Gibson missed its pit box during a stop in the hour before last, its crew taking 60 seconds to recover the car, resulting in a two-minutes and 20 second stop that has put them off-sequence. Although Nick Yelloly’s pace had swung the #43 car briefly back to the lead, he now runs fourth, followed by the two IDEC Sport cars – #28 ahead of #18 – and the #29 TDS Racing ORECA, which is currently second in the Pro/Am ranks.
Kelvin van der Linde has relieved star teammate Valentino Rossi after a recent pit stop, and after six hours the #46 Team WRT BMW M4 LMGT3 EVO leads LMGT3, with 86 laps complete and a growing gap to the #92 Manthey 1st Phorm Porsche 911 LMGT3 R.
Ryan Hardwick, the Bronze driver in the #92, has recently relieved Riccardo Pera, who was rapid during his stint, posting fastest LMGT3 lap of the race, a 3:56.179. He has Finn Gehrsitz in the #78 Akkodis ASP Lexus behind him in third. The #21 Vista AF Corse Ferrari and the #87 ASP Lexus round out the top five.
60 of the 62 starters are still running: The #88 Proton Competition Ford Mustang is the only retirement of the race after Giammarco Levorato’s crash at Tertre Rouge. Sadly the #60 Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG has been in the garage for an engine problem and has only just emerged from lengthy repair work.
A brief Full Course Yellow occurred after the #95 United Autosports McLaren LMGT3 EVO stopped along the Mulsanne Straight. Darren Leung was able to find a gap in the barrier to pull the car safely off the course, the race returning to green again in just a couple minutes.
Night-time driving has officially begun at Le Mans, and to some, the race has only truly begun from here.
