Early leader at Le Mans – the Toyota TS 040 Hybrid of Alexander Wurz, Stephane Sarrazin and Kazuki Nakajima. Photo credit: Toyota Racing
By Jack Webster
The 24 Hours of Le Mans started under sunny skies and the competition from the first lap was incredible. Toyota, as expected, shot to an early lead with the #07 car of Alexander Wurz taking charge at the green flag.
There has been close racing overall, with the Toyotas, Audis and Porsches constantly mixing it up in the opening laps of the race. To the observer, it would not appear that this is the beginning of a 24 hour race, it looks more like the finish of a two hour sprint and yet the race has hardly started.
First to falter was the #14 Porsche 919 Hybrid, which went into the garage within the first 30 minutes of the race with a fuel flow problem. Four laps later it rejoined the fray, however back in 9th and last place in the LMP class and 50th overall.
As they say, it always rains at Le Mans, and this year is no exception. A sudden downburst has really played havoc with the race and a major incident has taken place on the Mulsanne which has taken out the #3 Audi R-18 e-tron Quattro of Marco Bonanomi, who was the innocent victim of a spinning Ferrari and the Toyota TS 040 Hybrid being driven by Nicolas Lapierre. Lapierre’s Toyota was still on slick tires and when he attempted to slow for a Porsche off to the right of the track, he just skated into the guardrail and made contact with the Audi, which was then slammed by the #81 class leading Ferrari F458 Italia.
Lapierre’s Toyota suffered considerable damage, but was able to be driven back to the pits for repairs. Unfortunately for both Bonanomi and Audi Sport Team Joest the #3 car was too damaged to continue.
So here we are, barely an hour and a half into the race and Toyota, Audi and Porsche each have two cars left in the race. One Audi has been retired, one Toyota has been delayed due to an accident, and one Porsche has been delayed with technical difficulties.
That leaves 2 Audis vs. one strong Toyota and one strong Porsche. At his point, you would have to say advantage Audi.
However, judging from what has happened so far, who knows what the next 22 hours might bring. Stay tuned.
UPDATE: With just under 3 hours completed, Timo Bernhard in the Porsche 919 Hybrid has just taken the lead of the race, the first time Porsche has led overall at Le Mans since 1998. Wow.