Toyota knocked Audi off the top of the timesheets at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in a warm-up session that ended with a red flag.
Audi posted the fastest lap during test day, qualifying and the free practice sessions, and had been looking good to take another during warm-up, polesitter Loic Duval taking an early advantage with a 3m 26.769s.
With just five minutes of the session to run, Nicolas Lapierre put the #7 TS030 into the top spot with a 3m 26.227s, faster than either Toyota has gone during the course of the weekend. The Frenchman’s laptime came at the expense of the #2 Audi and Tom Kristensen, who suffered a clash with the #67 IMSA Performance Matmut Porsche 911 GT3 RSR whilst trying to lap Pascal Gibon, and was forced to coast back to the pits.
Lapierre’s session also came close to being ended when Tor Graves spun the #25 Delta-ADR in front of the Toyota heading into the Porsche Curves. Locking up all four wheels meant Lapierre was able to avoid slamming into the stationary Oreca, and keep both himself and teammates Alexander Wurz and Kazuki Nakajima on top, but he was unable to avoid running over the wreckage at speed, cracking the front right headlight and damaging bodywork in the process.
Despite its problems, Duval’s early laptime was enough to keep the #2 Audi in second place in the session, with the sister #1 R18 e-tron of reigning champions Marcel Fassler, Andre Lotterer and Benoit Treluyer – who completed no laps – slotting in behind. Lucas di Grassi ensured all three Audis finished in the top four. The second Toyota of Anthony Davidson, Sebastien Buemi and Stephane Sarrazin meanwhile split the two Rebellion Racing entries, with the #12 Lola setting the fifth fastest time ahead of its sister #13 Lola in seventh.
John Martin took the top of the LMP2 standings G-Drive Racing had been looking good for until the closing stages of qualifying, the #26 Oreca of the Australian, Roman Rusinov and Mike Conway pipping Brendon Hartley, Mark Patterson and Karun Chandhok in the #48 Murphy Prototypes Oreca. Ferrari and Porsche meanwhile managed to break Aston Martin Racing’s stranglehold in the GT category, with the #71 AF Corse 458 Italia of Oliver Beretta, Kamui Kobayashi and Toni Vilander setting the fastest Pro lap, Patrick Dempsey, Joe Foster and Patrick Long in the #77 Dempsey Del Piero-Proton 911 GT3 taking Am honours.
– Shots courtesy of Eric Fabre.
