It does not come as a surprise that Porsche will start the 2015 24 Hours of Le Mans in the front grid with all the three cars. The team has already set a new qualifying lap record breaking the former one that was set by Peugeot. In addition to the new record, they have also managed to top every session in this year’s preparations starting with test sessions to qualifying.
In that regard, the #18 Porsche 919 Hybrid of Neel Jani will lead the Porsche front grid lock out tomorrow while the #8 Audi R18 e-tron quattro will lead the Audi team from 4th, 5th and 6th. Two Toyota TS040 Hybrids will be in 7th and 8th ahead of two Rebellion Racing R-Ones in 9th and 10th. The three new Nissan GT-R LM NISMO’s will start in 12th, 13th and 14th.
The #19 Porsche 919 Hybrid topped the timesheets during the first two-hour qualifying session albeit it did not match the time set by the sister car on Wednesday. The #7 Audi R18 e-tron quattro was second in this session while the #18 Porsche claimed third. TDS Racing Oreca 05 was the quickest LMP1 car in Q2 leading the #26 G-Drive Racing Ligier of Sam Bird.
The session came to an end when the #63 Corvette Racing C7R of Jan Magnussen crashed at the Porsche turn. The driver was rushed to the medical center but was soon released, he was conscious during the extraction process in the heavily damaged Corvette. The car was withdrawn from the event as it could not be repaired on site. Aston Martin went ahead to set the fastest times in both LMGTE-Pro and Am classes.
Q3 saw an additional 30 minutes added to the 2-hour session to compensate for the premature ending of Q2. Nevertheless, there was another red flag session when the #67 Team AAI Porsche 911 caught fire. There were no major improvements in this session over the previous ones. Two Audi’s topped the timesheet in LMP1 sharing the podium with the #17 Porsche.
Friday is normally a rest day for the drivers before the main race kicks off on Saturday. There will be several PR activities taking place at the track as well. Take a look at our Le Mans Live Blog for full details on how and where to watch the race.
