Event Features
Le Mans Wednesday Qualifying Report
By Text: Jimmy Sykes
Jun 14, 2007, 16:41

As the green light went on for the first session of practice and qualifying for the 24 Hours of Le Mans the anticipation of what would become of the Audi/Peugeot battle was in the air. Peugeot’s return to the track this year with their 908 diesel powered prototype has the French countryside buzzing in what might bring the trophy back from Ingolstadt to the home country.

As the cars took to the track there were a few early incidents such as the #15 Charouz Racing P1 Lola hit the barriers at Tertre Rouge and the PSI Experience Corvette spun before the Dunlop bridge before going on undamaged. Not long into the session, Frank Biela would start of the Audi/Peugeot dual by putting down a time of 3:30.287, which was already faster than the pole time of last year. Biela continued to improve his time as the dusty public roads that make up the course started to be cleaned and allow the cars more and more traction.

The tire problems from test days started to rear their head again as the #82 LNT Panoz of Robert Bell as he had what he described as a “tire explosion” which damaged the front of the car and required him to limp it back to pit lane. The front underwing and headlight assembly were damaged and the car would not return to the track for during the first session. Bell later commented on the problem, “There just was a big explosion in the Hunaudières... and it was obviously the front right tyre. Extensive damage to front end, we won't be coming back out before the second session tonight.”



The other LNT Panoz had it even worse as it had a clutch slave cylinder problem just after leaving the pits and failed to complete even one full lap.

At about 30 minutes into the session Biela again upped the ante and put down a time of 3:28.301, which would then hold out for the rest of the session and leave the Audi R10 at the top of the charts after the first of four practice/qualifying sessions before the big event.

Peugeot took the session slowly as the ran a fraction of the laps that the Audi team ran and spent much time wheeling the car back in and out of the garage.

The P2 team that was fastest on test day was also starting the session slowly. The Barazi Epsilon Zytek, which was co-fastest with its team car two weekends ago was dealing with a misfire and only did 8 laps during the session. That did not keep them down though and they fixed the problem and still finished the session with the fastest P2 time overall at 3: 44.158, a few seconds off their fast time at testing.

The story of the first session though would undoubtedly be in GT1 and it wasn’t the famed Corvette/Aston Martin battle that would headline it. It was the LOC Lamborghini driven by Marco Apicella that caught everyone’s eyes as he had a violent accident going into the Playstation chicane (the first one on the Mulsanne). The car snapped around, as it started braking and spun out of control, clipping the barrier on drivers right at the entrance to the chicane before bouncing across the gravel trap, across the track on the exit of the chicane and into the barrier on the far side. Since the car skipped across the gravel, there was very little speed scrubbed off of the car and it hit the barrier with considerable force causing significant damage to the car and close to a 50-minute red flag during the session. Marco was removed from the car with considerable caution and taken away to the hospital. He looks to have escaped serious injury, however the damage to the car looks too extensive for it to be fixed in time.

As a result of the time taken to clean up after the Lamborghini accident, the session was extended for 15 minutes, which threw a new twist into the mix. Just before the session would have ended before being extended, the rain came in and came in heavily. The cars went to wet tires and some of them decided to brave it and get some rain data as the forecast for the race looks like rain will play a part. Audi decided to send its cars out, while Peugeot decided it would wait for the second session. Who made the right call? The rain created a very tricky track, as the Mulsanne and Arnage were very wet, while the stat finish line remained dry. This is normal for a very tricky circuit such as Le Mans that spreads out over such a large area.

In the end, Biela’s early time would stand as fastest and would lead the #8 Peugeot, the #3 Audi R10, the #7 Peugeot and finally the #2 R10 rounded out the top five. The first gasoline powered car was the #16 Pescarolo that was two seconds back of the #2 R10 and five seconds back from the fastest time.

The Barazi Epsilon car stood at the top even after running only 8 laps and having engine troubles, followed by the two Lolas of Binnie Motorsports and Quifel ASM respectively.



GT1 was a class that seemed to be feeling out the conditions and was fairly mixed up. The Oreca Saleen, #55 lead the pack with a time of 3:53.272, followed closely by the #009 Aston Martin DBR9 0.4 seconds back and the other Team Oreca Saleen a second behind the Aston. These times would undoubtedly come down in future sessions, as the battle would begin to take shape.

Scuderia Ecosse would take the early lead in GT2 with their Ferrari F430 and a time of 4:04.185 followed by the IMSA Performance Porsche RSR and Risi Competizione’s Ferrari F430.

Lucas Luhr had this to say about the evening so far:

“We did some basic work, and then unfortunately the Lamborghini crash stopped the session. Hopefully we can continue our programme. It's not our target to go for a top time in qualifying, we are working on the race. We should not be in such bad shape.”

Frank Biela also had some comments on his fastest time and the session:

"We are very happy. The times mean nothing in the first session. The lap times will be faster later if it's dry. We are still sorting out some things. We left testing with a good car. There was no traffic on my fast lap. I really like the new Tertre Rouge corner. It used to be slippery and the barrier came back on itself. Now it's a really nice corner, I think they did a good thing. You enter the straight a lot faster, maybe it takes off 1-2 seconds a lap, and with Arnage being wider, it could mean 3 seconds a lap faster than last year.”

The second session got under way a few minutes late due to the delay in the earlier session and cars went out about 10:10pm local time. The rain was still of and on and parts of the track are wet, so most cars were on intermediate tires including the Audi R10s. Marco Werner made his first laps this session and all the teams are concentrating on making sure all its drivers put in the required laps in the dark to prepare them for the race.

As the session went on the track proceeded to dry out and the teams would start to transition from intermediate to dry tires. A few early spins in the session caused some teams some grief, however, most were not serious or caused any damage. However, one that did occurred with the Swiss Spirit Lola which crashed on the Mulsanne after the Playstation chicane. The car suffered heavy front-end damage and some to the rear as well. The track was cleared fairly quickly and the session would go green again at 10:39 pm local.

As the times started to drop, it was Dindo Capello that drew first blood for the second session. His time of 3:48.273 was still far off the dry times, but would lead to the start of the fast times of the day. The track continued to dry and the rain was staying away and it looked like the session would come down to the final half hour or so.

With 20 minutes to go, Stephane Sarrazin put in a 3:29.410 lap which and then just minutes later went 3:27.029, beating out the fast time of the Audi from the previous session. Then, with only six minutes to go in the session, Audi and McNish decided to fight back and threw in a time of 3:27.017 to snatch the pole back from Peugeot and then on the following lap lowered the time again to a 3:26.919.

Then on the final lap of the session, the #8 Peugeot driven by Sarrazin broke out a 3:26.344 lap, faster than the test day time and fastest of anyone overall that night to put the Peugeot on the provisional pole after the first two sessions of qualifying for Saturday. The team was very excited in the pits and they had shown Audi that being fastest on the test day was not a fluke and they were here to race.

In P2 the time from the first session stood and left the Barazi Epsilon Zytek on the pole in that class.

GT1 had its own battle that came down to the wire as the Oreca Saleen held the fastest time as the track was drying till the Larbre Racing Aston Martin took the fast lap with a time of 3:50.761 leaving them on the provisional pole for Saturday’s race.



The Ferrari of Scuderia Ecosse was able to keep its lead through the second session and finished the day with a fast time of 4:04.185, as did the IMSA Performance Porsche and Risi Ferrari, finishing in that order.

So Peugeot would set the pace for others to follow for night two and left Audi wondering if there was some reliability to go along with the speed they were obviously showing. P2 finished as expected with the Zytek on top and the GT1 and GT2 classes finished with the possibilities of epic battles in the cards as Aston took one over their Corvette and Saleen competitors and the Ferrari/Porsche battle that we have heard so many times at Le Mans was in full force.

With rain expected to come in and out throughout the weekend, would these times set the grid for Saturday or would the other guys get a chance to come back and get some revenge? Time would tell.

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