After the extraordinary Hyperpole signed by Antonio Fuoco, Ferrari ends Thursday’s day also leading in Free Practice 4, the last test session before the 24h of Le Mans, which will start on Saturday at 16.00.
The protagonists of the FIA World Endurance Championship returned to action on the Circuit de la Sarthe for 60′ at night, interrupted (with subsequent recovery of lost time) due to yet another problem afflicting a Peugeot.
This time the 9X8 #93 stopped along the ‘Hunaudières’ straight without the Lion’s car driven at that moment by Jean-Eric Vergne wanting to start again.
At that point the marshals stopped everything to load the French prototype onto the tow truck, among other things interrupting the long-runs that most of the competitors were facing trying to figure out how to behave in the race, with relative performance.
#709 Glickenhaus Racing Glickenhaus 007 of Franck Mailleux, Nathanael Berthon, Esteban Gutierrez
Photo by: Marc Fleury
At the end of the activities James Calado’s Ferrari 499P #51 finished at the top of the Hypercar Class with a good 3’27″275, trimming 1″ ahead of all the pursuers, the Glickenhaus boys surprisingly first.
The 007 LMH #709 moves into second position, closely followed by the Porsches of Jota #38 and Team Penske #6, while the Action Express Racing Cadillac #311 is also in the Top5.
The Toyotas are satisfied with sixth (#7) and 14th (#8) place, the Ferrari #50 is seventh ahead of the Peugeot #93, but by now the real values in the field will only be understood during the race, since no one he really showed what he’s capable of, just missing the 15′ Warm-Up on Saturday morning.
#923 Racing Team Turkey Oreca 07 – Gibson of Salih Yoluc, Tom Gamble, Dries Vanthoor
Photo by: Alexander Trienitz
In the LMP2 Class for the first time we have a PRO/AM Oreca in the lead, i.e. the #923 of Racing Team Turkey who laps in 3’36″229, detaching by about half a second the #65 of Panis Racing and the #63 of Prema Racing, with United Autosports #23 and AF Corse #80 completing the Top5 in less than 1″.
Behind the Piacenza team’s car – according to PRO/AM – we find Jota #28, Prema #9, United Autosports #22, Team WRT 31 and Cool Racing #37 in the top 10, all in a couple of seconds.
#66 JMW Motorsport Ferrari 488 GTE EVO of Thomas Neubauer, Louis Prette, Giacomo Petrobelli
Photo by: Alexander Trienitz
The Ferraris are back in front in the LMGTE AM Class: the reference time is set by the 488 #66 of JMW Motorsport in 3’52″965, by a whisker better than the #57 of Kessel Racing.
The Porsches of Iron Lynx #60, Proton Competition #16 and Project 1-AO #56 close in the Top5 less than half a second behind, behind which remain the Corvette #33 and the Ferraris of AF Corse #54 and #21.
NorthWest AMR-Heart of Racing’s #98 Aston Martin climbs into the Top10 behind Proton Competition’s #88 Porsche, both under second off the pace.
Finally, the return of the Chevrolet Camaro NASCAR ZL1 driven by Hendrick Motorsports/Garage 56, which had been stopped by technical problems during Free Practice 3 in the afternoon, should be noted.
Friday is the rest day for the protagonists of the 24h, who will return to the Circuit de la Sarthe on Saturday at 12:00 for the 15′ Warm-Up, before the start of the Centenary race.
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