At last .. things have kicked off.. ‘free practice’ is underway … guess what.. we will actually see racing cars on the track at last. As Le Mans regulars will know this opening session is ‘free’ .. In other words the cars and drivers will be timed but the times don’t go towards the qualifying times and grid positions. All a bit pointless you may say... nope … this is about the only chance these guys have to sort out niggling problems, or in the case of the #81 Jaguar XKRS rebuilt the car from the ground up. It has been quite a lively session if you happen to be the proud owner of Ford GT run by Matech and sponsored by Sintez. Today they are showing signs of having a couple of close and meaningful relationship with the scenery. First to hit the local architecture was Romain Grosjean in the #60 Ford car.. he arrived at The Porsche Curves pedalling a wee bit too hard and locked everything up while braking on a bumpy bit, he then left rubber all over the track, followed by very respectably ploughed furrow in the gravel before breaking his fall against the tyre wall… the back end bore the brunt of the impact and looked a bit the worse for the close encounter. Not wishing to be outdone ‘les jolie femmes’ decided to grab the spotlight and Rahel Frey spun a bit sooner and a bit slower and hit the wall a bit sooner. The car emerged looking rather second hand with its rear spoiler detached and a somewhat crumpled rear end. The fragrant Rahel seemed to emerge undamaged. Now.. this presents the team with a tiny weenie problem .. they are currently short of a fully functioning car and really have to get all three girls out for ten laps each during this free practice session and they won’t manage it, their cause was not helped when Grosjean’s accident brought out ‘Le Drapeau Rouge’ and the session was stopped. Another car struggling badly is the Jaguar XKRS because they have spent almost the entire session on axle stands with two ‘rookie’ drivers kicking their heels in urgent need of ten laps qualifying as well.
We have just heard that the ACO have stepped in and are allowing the teams to carry on into tonight’s session to clear the backlog.. this will possibly get the Jaguar out of a hole but we don’t know how badly damaged the two Fords are .
So, what is going on at the sharp end of the field.. well just at the moment the Peugeots are looking ever so slightly rapid.. rather more rapid than the Audis to be honest. How can these good ‘ol oil burners possibly go that bl**dy quick. The weather is cold, cloudy and overcast so if the rain holds off we may see some very rapid times later this evening. The Peugeots give the impression they are just warming up and having a gentle stretch by way of a warm up, they have comfortably smashed last years pole position times with, we rather suspect, more to come.
The Audis are their usual Teutonic selves .. no fuss.. ‘am I boffered.. do I look boffered? Well we think they maybe ought to be a bit boffered.. they simply don’t seem to have the raw pace of the Peugeots.
The ‘petrol’ challenge is being led by the two Lola B09/60-Aston Martins.. 009 and 007 and the stunning Lola B10/60-Rebellion is third. (take a look at the livery if you get the chance!)
GT1 is rather nicely poised .. with the No52 AMR Young Driver Aston DBR9 ahead of the No72 Luc Alphand Aventures Corvette C6.R who in turn are ahead of the No70 Ford GT .. nice mix?
In GT2 the ‘works No64 Corvette ZR1 tops the sheets , actually it is ahead of some rather swift GT1s! At last Porsche look like getting their act together after last year’s debacle, this time Marc Lieb is second in the No 77 Team Felbermayer-Proton Porsche 997 GT3 RSR ( snappy eh?) and sounding confident.. He has however split the factory Corvettes.
Any surprises? Not really .. except maybe the JLOC Lamborghini Murcielago R-SV.. after a spectacular one lap extravaganza last year it has actually done an impressive 29 laps today with only one puncture. That is real progress for a car run by the Japanese Lamborghini Owners Club. The Ford GTs have shown their pace during the season so far so it is a pity that one is badly dented at the moment. We have eyewitnesses that suggest the damage ‘wont polish out with T-Cut’.
It looks like some of the best actual racing might come from the GT Classes.. It is good to see the Astons taking on the ‘Vettes.. But the No64 ‘Vette in the hands of Emmanuel Collard looks dangerously rapid and they are so darned laid back at this stage of the game.
Next up is proper qualifying in the dark …
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