Dries Vanthoor in the #15 BMW M Team WRT snapped up the fastest lap of the session in the final moments of FP3, putting in the first 3:23 of the session (3:23.302), beating Will Stevens’s long-held fastest time by 0.3 seconds.
The #36 Alpine Endurance Team car driven by Victor Martins followed the Belgian to the top of the timing sheet with less than three minutes remaining, finishing the session second-fastest, also in the 3:23s (3:23.725) but 0.4 seconds off of Vanthoor. Will Stevens improved on his early flying lap in the end as well, finishing the session third quickest in the #12 Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA car.
Early in the session, the Hypercar field was running qualifying simulations, with most cars strapping on new medium-compound tyres. The #009 and #007 Aston Martin THOR Team Valkyries were the first ones on softs right away in practice, and the #15 BMW and #94 Peugeot ran hard tyres in the first and second stints of the session.
Will Stevens’ first flying lap in the #12 Cadillac was in the 3:24.0s today, while the fastest time in Qualifying was 3:23.1 yesterday evening. With extra traffic and potentially a larger fuel load, the field was surely pushing hard, setting banker laps before getting into their long runs.
One hour in, the #44 Proton Competition brought out a caution after venturing into the gravel trap at the Porsche curves, taking damage and stranding itself, requiring a retrieval. Horst Felix Felbermayr was instructed to “zig-zag” by race control to shake out gravel from his ORECA 07-Gibson before nursing the car back to the pits.
The only Full Course Yellow of the session was caused by some debris near the pit entry following a near-miss moment between the #29 Forestier Racing by Panis ORECA and the #009 Heart of Racing Valkyrie.
And 11 drivers recieved five minute stop-and-go penalties for track warnings after their fifth offence over the course of Practice 3.
The Valkyries continued running Softs all the way through, putting at least laps on four or five sets, but not stomping up the order. The #009 put in 44 laps, the #007 put in 37, both sitting around 13th and 15th positions all session, and finishing in 14th and 15th, respectively.
All three classes looked to punish their tyres during FP3, with runners putting more than 35 laps on their medium compound tyres.
With 25 minutes remaining, a hard shunt from Daniel Schneider in the #222 United Autosports in the Ford Chicane brought out a red flag just as the Hypercar field began to heat up some flying laps. The session got back underway with 16 minutes to go.
The #29 Forestier by Panis ORECA remained at the top of LMP2 the majority of the session, finishing with a fastest time of 3:34.252 recorded by Oliver Gray, with the #30 Duqueine Team car less than a blink behind with a 3:34.253, 0.001 seconds off. The #343 Inter Europol Competition car finished the session third fastest, 0.4 seconds back.
In LMGT3, the #23 Heart of Racing Aston Martin finished the fastest of the GTs with a 3:53.708 set by Eduardo Barrichello, with the #32 Team WRT BMW second fastest. The #87 Akkodis ASP Team Lexus was raising eyebrows all session, taking curbs especially aggressively with José María López at the wheel; that car finished third-quickest.
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