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00:00:01Traffic jam in the pits, Audi coming in, Peugeot going out, that is Marc Genet in car number 9, that is the second place car.
00:00:10We've been running up behind the collars Audi, car number 14, that car coming in from 8th position.
00:00:17Now there's two R10 TDIs, might suddenly become a bit of a salvation for Audi Simon Hill.
00:00:25Six untried rookie drivers, a new team, new cars to them, different cars from the cars that won here last year for Audi,
00:00:34but already back up into the top 10, so those cars picking up pace every lap.
00:00:39Very, very strong, especially as Valdsman jumping in because of the problem, Narain Kartikain appears to have a physical problem,
00:00:45we think it's a shoulder problem of some sort. Question is, of course, is Narain going to be fit enough to drive?
00:00:50They haven't qualified any other drivers, used to be the days where you'd swap drivers around from car to car,
00:00:56can't do that anymore, of course, so it could be a potential problem, we're hoping that Narain's okay,
00:01:01but you're very, very right there, Marc, in terms of the pace, they've started to get themselves into a nice race rhythm.
00:01:05We've looked at their qualifying times, maybe not as quick as we would have expected,
00:01:09the Stracker car, for example, Danny Watts out qualified both of their cars, so that could be very, very significant.
00:01:15The question I had when I looked at this line-up, at the start of the year, especially at Le Mans,
00:01:20why didn't they find a Pirro and a Beeler and put one in each car as a real, like, solid base for them?
00:01:25That would have been a great move, I think.
00:01:26Well, I agree, that would at least continue some continuity, because then, Jeremy, you'd have two drivers,
00:01:32one in each car, who knew what an R10 TDI felt like when it was in the sweet spot.
00:01:36As it is, their drivers here, their drivers in the Le Mans series, it's all new to them.
00:01:41So, I mean, it's a huge learning curve, and really, every lap these cars do, they're getting quicker and quicker,
00:01:46because they know more and more.
00:01:47Yeah, but then again, you know, this is a ground-up operation in terms of sports car racing,
00:01:51so I can understand, perhaps, that coming in with some very talented young, very talented young drivers,
00:01:56who, you know, conceivably could, or at least hoped, to have a career in Formula One.
00:02:01And it appears now that's not going to happen, so they've got some of the best drivers you could possibly get.
00:02:05I mean, Noreen Karthikeyan, he's a proven talent.
00:02:08And the same goes for, you know, for all of these guys, quite frankly.
00:02:12Certainly, you know, the guys who are in the cars.
00:02:15At the moment, Charles Zwoltzmann is a useful driver. Andre Lotterer, an extremely good driver.
00:02:20Now, Zwoltzmann and Andre Lotterer have just swapped over.
00:02:23Yes.
00:02:24So, we still need to find a copy of the rules and find out whether you actually have to use all three drivers,
00:02:30or whether the Collers team could say, look, he's effectively nearly broken his flipping shoulder.
00:02:35There's, it's not even remotely safe to send him out, but don't make us retire the car because of this.
00:02:40You know, beyond anybody's possible, you know, planning that this could happen,
00:02:45I would think they should be allowed to claim force majeure and be able to continue with two drivers, but...
00:02:51On a similar note then, Martin, could they take a force majeure situation and say, can we rotate our five drivers between two cars?
00:02:59No.
00:03:00Could there be a way they could do that?
00:03:01No, because you've got one healthy car. The only question is whether the 14 car will be allowed to remain running.
00:03:07So, I don't think you could use five over two, but certainly one car with just two, that might be a possibility.
00:03:14It's interesting you mentioned about the...
00:03:16Well, we're hearing here from Mark Lieb about the car, couldn't get the Porsche back in.
00:03:21Unfortunately, the mechanics couldn't do anything until it gets in the pit lane.
00:03:26We saw it being pushed out of the way by the marshals, but this fuel problem, it was running right down and we could see the lights coming on and off.
00:03:34They were flicking the ignition, trying to get the reserve power to go, resetting the ignition, resetting everything.
00:03:39Short of hitting it with a Birmingham screwdriver, there really wasn't much else they could do.
00:03:45And unfortunately, and that really was Porsche's A number one driver line-up.
00:03:50That was as close to a factory Porsche as you can get.
00:03:53With Norbert Singer in the garage, engineering three factory drivers, it might have been Horst Felbermeyer Senior's entry,
00:04:00but it was as close to a factory Porsche effort as you're going to get without having Rothman splashed all over it or Martini.
00:04:06So, that car it now looks like may well be meeting the marker of doom a lot earlier than we expected.
00:04:12But again, look at the pictures here from everywhere around the circuit. Cars, cars, cars.
00:04:17This is 12 kilometres, an eight-mile track, and yet, Simon, there's still no clear air for anyone anywhere.
00:04:22I mentioned earlier, we saw that onboard with Montagne, there was a point where he had a little bit of a run,
00:04:26but you talked about talented young drivers.
00:04:28Well, here's a great example.
00:04:29Bruce Schweine and Nicolas Lapierre, both F1 standard drivers, if ever there was one.
00:04:33Lapierre, GP2 race winner, A1 GP, flashing his lights now.
00:04:37It seems like the Orica car has found some really good race pace.
00:04:41Again, didn't perhaps qualify as high up as maybe we would have thought.
00:04:44And certainly, a big setback with Otelli having his off.
00:04:47But clearly, the race pace is there.
00:04:49Lapierre, very experienced, of course, at Le Mans as well.
00:04:51And he's just set the fastest lap that that car has set thus far in the race, chasing down Bruce Schweine.
00:04:57Bruce Schweine and there's a great little battle, isn't it, too?
00:05:00As you say, very talented Frenchman coming up behind one of the Luc Alfond Aventure Chevy Corvettes through the Porsche curves.
00:05:06And there is nothing you can do.
00:05:08You just have to follow the guy through there and then try to get a run on the straights.
00:05:12But these GT1 Corvettes have had an awful lot of horsepower.
00:05:15And really, they're only going to be able to make their move under braking, which is what they will do right now.
00:05:19And they've got by one.
00:05:21And look what's right in front of them through the second part of the Ford S.
00:05:23There's another one of the beggars.
00:05:25Those two Alfond Corvettes, I have to say, they're not exactly that far apart on pace, are they?
00:05:29What, we're two hours in and they're not even a hundred metres apart.
00:05:33Interesting decision by Nicola Lapierre there to sit behind the Corvette through the despite, as you pointed out, Martin,
00:05:39that he'd just set the fastest lap that that car had done.
00:05:42Clearly, he knows he's got the pace to get in front of Giovanni.
00:05:44But whether it was a radio call, like, chill out, Nicola, just wait there.
00:05:48Or whether it was a good decision by a very intelligent racing driver.
00:05:51He's always been a real thinking driver.
00:05:53Some of the drives he's had in the other formulas shows you that the guy doesn't drive just with his heart like some drivers do.
00:05:59He uses a lot of nous.
00:06:00And certainly, that could play into his hands later on.
00:06:03Yeah, I don't think anybody's going to take ridiculous chances at the moment.
00:06:08But I think everybody now really understands this race.
00:06:12Every single opportunity could be the difference between finishing on the podium.
00:06:16I was going to say in the points, but obviously there aren't.
00:06:18Finishing on the podium or not.
00:06:20And he's got a good run going here.
00:06:23A little gallic gesture from Lapierre.
00:06:25Oh, that is the way I am quicker than you.
00:06:29What, can you not see me?
00:06:30Well, I always notice whenever I drive in France that usually French drivers are quite good.
00:06:33If you flash their lights, they'll get out of your way.
00:06:35But clearly this two Frenchmen fighting for the biggest motor race in the world is a bit more at stake.
00:06:39But interesting how quickly Johnny's dropped off there.
00:06:41You can see that the aerodynamics of the car clearly have been affected as we know.
00:06:45And it's very, very interesting to see that he's gone away so quickly.
00:06:49Well, the Pescarello car then now running in 11th and up to 10th has gone the number 11 Orica AIM.
00:06:57So that car in the top 10 for the first time.
00:07:01We're going to join our colleagues at Eurosport 1 in just a moment on Eurosport International.
00:07:13And run through a quick highlight of what's been happening so far live at Le Mans.
00:07:18So, welcome back to Le Mans.
00:07:22Those of you who have been watching Eurosport throughout the afternoon.
00:07:26We've been live on Eurosport 2 since we left you last.
00:07:30And, well, huge amounts of drama.
00:07:33Jeremy Shaw, we've had more drama outside the first hour as well.
00:07:38We've had a couple of problems for the Peugeot.
00:07:40We've had just recently a problem for one of the Orica cars going off the road.
00:07:44It's been very tense at the front and all through the classes as well.
00:07:49Yeah, well, after a sort of manic first hour, it's now the race has somewhat settled down.
00:07:54Unfortunately, during the safety car that came out as a result of that blown tyre on the number 7 Peugeot.
00:08:01There were two pace cars out on the track as is the norm here at Le Mans.
00:08:07And, unfortunately, that split up the two race leaders and allowed Frank Montani in car number 8
00:08:12to have about a half a lap lead over the rest of the field.
00:08:16That he has not only maintained because when it went back to green flag racing,
00:08:20the gap was about 1 minute 45 seconds.
00:08:23It's now 2 minutes and 6 seconds over Marc Genet driving car number 9 a second on the Peugeots.
00:08:29And then the first of the Audi R15 TDIs has been on average around about 3 seconds a lap slower than the Peugeots.
00:08:38Alan McNish is still at the wheel of car number 1 as he has been since the start of the race.
00:08:43He is currently now in third place about 10 seconds behind Genet.
00:08:48And then there's a gap of another 30 seconds or so to Marco Werner,
00:08:52who has just taken over at the wheel of car number 2 from Mike Rockenfeller.
00:08:57At the top of the LMP2 class.
00:08:59Actually, very few dramas for the mechanically sound LMP2 cars.
00:09:02Those that start at the weekend with troubles have still got them.
00:09:05It's still Porsche dominating Caspar Elgaard for the S16 ahead of Seiji Aura in the Japanese Navi Team Gokar.
00:09:12And the gap between them there is hovering around 14, 15 seconds.
00:09:16Third and best of the rest is Xavi Pompidou and number 33 speedy Sabah Lola Coupe.
00:09:21In the GT1 class, the CompuWear Corvette 63 and 64.
00:09:26First and second ahead of the Alfa on Aventure Corvettes, third and fourth.
00:09:30And in GT2, Jörg Bergmeister leads for Porsche.
00:09:32But the number one Porsche car has run out of fuel.
00:09:36The Felbermeyer Porsche stopped just halfway through the Ford chicane and will not.
00:09:41It seems to be able to get back to the pit lane.
00:09:43The pump for their reserve tank packed up.
00:09:48So, it has been really pretty dramatic already.
00:09:51Now, this here's a car also has had a little bit of drama.
00:09:54The RML car had its floor damaged in this morning's morning warm-up.
00:09:58A collision with one of the Lola Aston Martins.
00:10:01Which incidentally, the Lola bigwigs are getting very annoyed at being referred to only as Aston Martin on the graphics.
00:10:09Few of the other cars are referred to only by their engine as opposed to the chassis and engine.
00:10:13So, I did say perhaps they'd be a little less grumpy if they had received a Formula 1 entry yesterday.
00:10:19But, it is a Lola Aston Martin in the same way that this is not a Mazda, it is a Lola Mazda.
00:10:25Indeed, and that Lola Mazda, it did make an unscheduled pinstop in the, just into the second hour.
00:10:30But, the car has certainly been running very well indeed.
00:10:33Tommy Erdos at the wheel of the car running as you say Martin Haven in third place in class.
00:10:39And that GT battle, Simon Hill, is just tremendous, isn't it?
00:10:42We've got Jörg Bergmeister in the lead now for the Flying Lizard team.
00:10:46Let's get down to the pits and to Christian Poulsen.
00:10:48It is a very, very close battle in the LMP2 category.
00:10:51How's it going for you guys out there for the moment?
00:10:54On to now, it's going very good.
00:10:56We are leading with 15 seconds and it looks good but it's very close.
00:11:01One second, one lap here, they are faster than us and the next we are faster than them.
00:11:05So, it's going to be a really, really close race.
00:11:08At the moment, your teammates are, your teammate Kasperlgaard is in the car.
00:11:12So, when is your first time?
00:11:14Yeah, I think in about one hour I'll get in the car for the first time.
00:11:17So, we'll see.
00:11:19Thank you very much.
00:11:20Thanks.
00:11:21So, Christian Poulsen, Danish World Touring Car driver in a BMW
00:11:27and in his second ever sports car race.
00:11:31The first time he drove that Essex Porsche RS Spyder was in the 1,000 km of Spa
00:11:38and getting ready to have his go.
00:11:40The car jump by Kasperlgaard leading that LMP2 category.
00:11:44Tommy Erdos in the RML car third behind the Navi Team Go Porsche RS Spyder
00:11:50and in fourth place Savi Pompidou in the speedy Sabah Lola Coupe.
00:11:54More action coming up on Eurosport.
00:11:57Welcome back live to Le Mans where there is more trouble, I'm afraid,
00:12:08for the Crucial and Motorsport team.
00:12:10The mechanics in this car did not go back to their hotel yesterday.
00:12:13They woke up on Friday morning, came to spend the off day rebuilding the car after dramas on Thursday,
00:12:20including a crash in the wet session on Wednesday as well.
00:12:23So, behind the eight ball so far that they're in a different pool hall.
00:12:26They stayed all night last night trying to fix the car.
00:12:30The turbocharger emptied the oil onto the circuit this morning during warm-up.
00:12:34Basically, this car has been nothing but trouble.
00:12:38If it was a horse you'd be calling the vet, but Jeremy Shaw, apparently that's not.
00:12:43They're not quite beaten, they are not ready to give up.
00:12:46They are going to get the damn thing back on track.
00:12:48John Portales has tried going in it, Matthew Marsh in it at the moment, but it's causing more trouble than it's worth.
00:12:54Well, an awful feeling of deja vu too, because it's exactly what happened one year ago, almost, to the incident, let's say.
00:13:01But we're watching there, that battle in GT, we can see the class leader, which is Jörg Bergmeister.
00:13:07And he has about only three seconds of a lead over the other Porsche there, Patrick Pille.
00:13:13Those two drivers, Jörg Bergmeister and Patrick Pille, both drove last year in the American Le Mans series for the Flying Lizard Motorsports team.
00:13:22Bergmeister still does so, he won the championship last year.
00:13:25And in the meantime, Patrick Pille has switched across to the IMSA Performance Matmut team.
00:13:30He is driving very nicely with Patrick Long, who's another Flying Lizard driver, and Raymond Narak.
00:13:35So, a good battle there, just less than three seconds between them.
00:13:39And the best of the Ferraris now, a full 40 seconds in arrears.
00:13:43I have to say, I did say earlier on, Patrick Pille and Raymond Narak.
00:13:47Raymond Narak is very much involved in the Matmut supermarkets, and that is him right behind the prototype.
00:13:52And Pille Narak, very experienced, they've done a lot of French GT racing, FIA GT racing.
00:13:57Not particularly frequent visitors to America, but they're very quick.
00:14:01And enormously impressed, he's less than six tenths of a second slower on the last lap, the Jörg Bergmeister,
00:14:07who is a factory-financed Porsche superstar.
00:14:10So, for an independent driver, all right, the cars are very, very equal.
00:14:14But the driver difference, there's not much between those two teams.
00:14:17As you say, Porsche 1-2, as quick Nick Manassion comes back out of the pits.
00:14:21Well, he's not going to have to be quick.
00:14:23He's going to have to be selecting warp drive to try and get this car anywhere near, even a top ten probably.
00:14:29Unless there is a, you know, fire and damnation somewhere.
00:14:33You're not suggesting he can't do that, are you?
00:14:35I'm not suggesting he can't do it, I'm just saying he's going to have to be engaging warp drive, Mr. Sulu.
00:14:39The other thing that, talking about that car that's had that problem also,
00:14:43just been watching the lap times that Timo Bernhard's been doing in the third, the number three Audi,
00:14:48and for a long time, the last seven or eight laps or so, he's been the quickest of the three Audis,
00:14:53obviously traffic permitting.
00:14:54Now, looking at that, he's unscheduled to be in the top six, certainly within the next couple of hours,
00:14:58based on what he's doing, assuming they don't have any more drama.
00:15:00So, to make your, to sort of continue the point you're making it, really is anything possible at this stage of the race from their point of view.
00:15:07That is the good news, the bad news is he is still two laps down,
00:15:10and while he is kind of lucky to be doing three minutes thirties,
00:15:14Frank Montagne has just turned another three minutes twenty six point nine.
00:15:18These Peugeots are at least three or four seconds a lap quicker than the Audis,
00:15:23and that is where Montagne had to lead at over two minutes, and he's still pulling away by three seconds a lap.
00:15:28And also, crucially, still three or four seconds quicker than the ACO wanted them to go,
00:15:33and the ACO had hoped to reel them back down to a three and a half minute lap,
00:15:37and it's still not got that gap down.
00:15:39Well, wait a minute, they've done that job perfectly apart from the Peugeots.
00:15:43Well, yes, okay, you could argue, you could venture that, you might well suggest that, I couldn't possibly comment.
00:15:51But again, we know these cars have been the quickest cars for the last three years.
00:15:54Last year, I remember seeing the, oh, better Glock up there, the fastest, the fastest Audi driver was Alexander Premat,
00:15:59who was something like in the region of four seconds slower than the slowest Peugeot driver, which was Jacques Villeneuve.
00:16:05So, you know, we know that pace has been there for a while.
00:16:07It now seems to be that Montagne and the rest of that eighth car, of course, which has got the Gloire de France behind it,
00:16:13the three French drivers all fighting for the glory.
00:16:16Then that's going to be interesting to see if they can all match that pace, which doubtlessly they can.
00:16:20Let's look at the choreography here.
00:16:22Only one air gun and one tire man are allowed to work on the car at any one time.
00:16:27So one man's round one side, but look, they have got two air guns and two men ready to use them.
00:16:32So one will undo the wheel nuts on one side, rush back, and the other guy and his teammate are...
00:16:38So all the teams are still using the four men they would have used, just not at the same time.
00:16:43So as everybody has said, right from the minute this rule was suggested by the ACO, zero cost saving whatsoever.
00:16:50And the possibility of making mistakes because you don't have the same team working down the same car is increased.
00:16:56Yeah, and great choreography down there, and as you're talking, we've got all the top three cars in LMP2,
00:17:01all in the pits at exactly the same time.
00:17:04The Essex car, Team Essex car, is just now pulling out of its pits door.
00:17:09Caspar Elgar has been driving that car, and he's been leading by not very much over Seiji Aura,
00:17:15who's still stationary on the pit lane. The fuel is still going in to car number five.
00:17:20But the RML car was here before the two Porsches arrived.
00:17:24That means the third place car is now a lap down, with 21 hours and 18 minutes to go.
00:17:30But he is a lap and a few inches behind the Team Go Navi car, not 150 meters behind as he leaves the pit lane.
00:17:36Indeed, and as you were talking about, those two cars left just about the same time, didn't they?
00:17:39So that was the gap you could kind of hear between first and second in LMP2.
00:17:44Again, riding on board down the Lins-Droit des Inaudière, the Mulsanne Strait,
00:17:49a very different view to that we had in the slicing, driving rain of Wednesday evening.
00:17:55And an awful lot safer going past the restaurant on the left.
00:17:58Fans packed all the way down this straight, right down to Mulsanne Corner.
00:18:03And a lot of the fans that come here, 250,000, 60,000 fans, a lot of them will use the free shuttle buses.
00:18:15Hop on, go off down to the chicane, down to the Mulsanne straight in the night if you've got a car.
00:18:20It is still one of the breathtaking things you can do in motorsport.
00:18:24Dead of night, hopefully with a little bit of mist in the air, cars whistling past you at over 200 miles an hour.
00:18:30There's a good shot there of Marc Genet taking a bit of a sip out of his drinks bottle there.
00:18:35They have a drinks bottle in which they will refresh at pretty much every pit stop, so they should do at every pit stop.
00:18:41And every now and again you'll see the driver there up there.
00:18:43I don't think you really need to hold on to that tube because everything is automated.
00:18:47There's a button on the steering which you will push, and that will, it will flex the fluid into as well.
00:18:55It will indeed. What you can see there is there's a little coupling there.
00:18:57The little white coupling means that the teams have, each driver just has his own little tube that pokes out of the front of his crash helmet.
00:19:03They break the coupling in the same way that they break the radio coupling, lock it back in that way.
00:19:07They don't have to completely change the whole system for each driver, and it's just another time-saving efficiency.
00:19:12And in fact, that's what this little red loop is you can see flapping around by his left shoulder.
00:19:17That is to help him tug the radio connection out without having to reach back blind behind it,
00:19:21because of course now everybody's got hands devices.
00:19:23Your head can move about five degrees either side of dead ahead, and after that you can't see a darn thing.
00:19:29And don't forget, in a helmet, your vision is very much tunnel vision anyway.
00:19:33Why they have wing mirrors on cars, God alone knows.
00:19:35They are absolutely redundant.
00:19:37Oh, and incidentally, somebody was asking on the emails,
00:19:40why does the driver not sit in the middle like a Formula One car?
00:19:43Why is there a sort of spare seat?
00:19:46Well, that goes back to the very first Le Mans race,
00:19:49when it was used to prove that motor cars, not racing cars, motor cars could be reliable.
00:19:56That was the whole point, the Grand Prix of Endurance.
00:19:59You were to drive the car for 24 hours, and ever since the first race, even with things like the Jaguar C-Type and D-Type,
00:20:06right up to the present day, it is a race for sports cars, not single-seaters.
00:20:12And so there is a dummy hole beside the driver.
00:20:15Novenally two-seaters.
00:20:17Novenally two-seaters, and occasionally, for very, very stupid journalists,
00:20:21it is possible to be fitted in there and terrified witless by a driver with a beaming green on his satanic face.
00:20:28Yeah, I'm not sure whether they do that these, and I certainly haven't opportunity to go out for a long time.
00:20:32I did have a run, many years ago, actually, here at Le Mans with Ray Malek,
00:20:36of course, the boss of the RML number 25 Lola Mazda.
00:20:40He drove me round in the Acosta C2 car, another lap around Mugello,
00:20:44in the Porsche 956 with Derrick Bell, that was exciting.
00:20:47Well, that's, what a chauffeur.
00:20:49I'll tell you, the passenger space in these cars is absolutely nominal, Simon Hill, isn't it?
00:20:55Yeah, absolutely right, it is, as Martin said, we're going back to the good old days, as it were,
00:20:59or the bad old days.
00:21:00Interesting, that very first Le Mans back in 1923, I watched an interesting documentary about it the other day,
00:21:04there was only something like nine cars retired.
00:21:06So, out of the entries, he actually did the job that it was designed to do,
00:21:09to prove to a slightly cynical public back in the day that these cars did actually work.
00:21:25I guess we're down in the Corvette pit here with Antonio Garcia.
00:21:32He's running good, Antonio Garcia.
00:21:34Just a bit of some setup changes during the pit stops,
00:21:39so that's why maybe we are spending a little bit longer.
00:21:42But, yeah, I mean, it's just 40 minutes before I go in first time, so I'm very excited.
00:21:48I said, everything runs according to plan, it's the last official outing for the Corvette here in Le Mans,
00:21:54so are you enjoying the race?
00:21:56I mean, I'll tell you once I'm in the car, but up to now, everything is fine.
00:22:00All during this week, everything was running as usual, so, yeah, pretty happy.
00:22:06Thank you very much.
00:22:08Interesting, Garcia, of course, a winner here last year with Aston Martin.
00:22:12You're going across to the dark side, I suppose, from a motor racing point of view,
00:22:15and what a great place to be.
00:22:17Niljani in now, the former winner of the A1 GP World Cup of Nations.
00:22:21Interesting driving a Lola chassis the A1 cars were back in the year that Nia won it for Team Switzerland.
00:22:26Max Velti, I saw in the paddock earlier, of course, was stalwart of the Salma Mercedes days
00:22:31when they were doing their stuff back in their Group C era.
00:22:35Of course, went on to be involved in that. You can see the guys doing their stops.
00:22:38Slightly different fuel rate because, of course, it is a petrol car rather than a diesel.
00:22:46Now, down in the pit lane, we think we may have an interview with the French Prime Minister in just a moment.
00:22:51A very interesting spectator.
00:22:53Well, perhaps he's going to chat a little bit later.
00:23:04Now, Jani coming back out again.
00:23:06Well, Nil, this is his first run in a prototype.
00:23:10And an interesting mixture of drivers with Biliki in there.
00:23:13You were talking about Biliki before.
00:23:14Fantastically talented guy.
00:23:15Very aggressive, of course.
00:23:17But also impressed me earlier this year.
00:23:19Jumped in the Porsche Super Cup at Monaco and did a tremendous job.
00:23:21So very, very versatile.
00:23:23And the speedy Seba type, Seba team have obviously taken over this car that was the Lola Aston Martin,
00:23:29the Cherouz Racing Systems car that was so quick.
00:23:32Remember, it went off quite early in the race last year.
00:23:34And I think without that, we could have seen a very, very different result problem, Jeremy.
00:23:38I think you're right.
00:23:39And Neil Jani, it's his first time in this car.
00:23:41He had just a couple of very brief test sessions before he came here.
00:23:44But he's certainly been turning to very consistent lap times in this car.
00:23:48And maybe we'll have a chance, an opportunity over the next couple of laps
00:23:51to see how quickly he can get back up to speed after making that routine pit stop.
00:23:56Looking at our screens, we see Alan McNish carving his way through, now in third position.
00:24:00And a man that knows Alan McNish extremely well, a good friend of his,
00:24:04and a man that was racing here last year for creation,
00:24:06is Jonny Molum and joins us in the commentary box.
00:24:09Jonny, what are you watching that you're seeing is starting to really interest you at this point, Jonny?
00:24:14What's really grabbing your attention?
00:24:15I tell you what's really, really worrying me is that the Audi race pace, in my mind,
00:24:20is not as fast as I was hoping it would be in comparison to the Peugeot.
00:24:23So I think we're almost back to a situation as we were last year,
00:24:26where Peugeot have a significant car advantage.
00:24:29And that's going to make it very, very difficult without weather to actually repeat last year's victory.
00:24:40Yeah, I think that's a very, very interesting point.
00:24:42We were picking up on that earlier, we were looking at the times,
00:24:44and you see that for a little while Bernhardt was the quickest of the three Audis
00:24:48after these problems coming through, but all three of them seem to be really, really struggling for pace.
00:24:52Do you think there's possibly that they've gone a bit too conservative on the way the cars run, Jon?
00:24:56I think, basically, I think they went out at Sebring and won,
00:24:59and everyone thought that that meant they were going to come here and win,
00:25:02but in actual fact the Peugeots did have a little bit of a performance advantage at Sebring still,
00:25:07and I think you're seeing that this is a new car, R15, they haven't got it sorted,
00:25:12and they don't really know how to unlock its full potential just yet,
00:25:15and you're seeing that clearly today.
00:25:17I think, I think you're right, Jonny.
00:25:19I think when they did most of their development on this R15 TDI,
00:25:22it was done in the nice, sunny, warm conditions down in the south of Spain,
00:25:27except it rained most of the time, so all of their early development had to be done in wet-to-weather conditions.
00:25:32The first time they really ran the car in anger in the dry was at Sebring,
00:25:36and yes, you're right, Peugeot did have a slight, fairly, very slight performance advantage at Sebring,
00:25:43and it was only really Alan McNish was the difference there.
00:25:46When he did that marathon stick towards the end of the race at Sebring,
00:25:50he'd been matching times with Sebastian Bordet when Bordet was driving at Peugeot,
00:25:55but for the last stint of the race, the last couple of hours, they put Frank Montagnier in the car,
00:26:00and for whatever reason, Frank wasn't able to get the same performance out of that Peugeot
00:26:05as had been Sebastian Bordet, so I suspect Nischa took off and won that race.
00:26:09But here, of course, a very different type of racetrack,
00:26:12and although it appeared that Peugeot and Audi were very closely matched through practice and qualifying,
00:26:18clearly in race conditions, that is not the case.
00:26:21Well, I'm glad you're joining us on British Eurosport now, and it's still Frank Montagnier in the lead,
00:26:37with the Peugeot car number 8, his last lap around at 3 minutes 30,
00:26:41the best lap he has done at 3 minutes 25.106,
00:26:46Marc Genet in the second of the Peugeot, car number 9 in second place,
00:26:49about 2 minutes and 12 seconds back, his best lap time at 3 minutes 26.1,
00:26:56in third place right now, the first of the Audis, car number 1, Alan McNish, his best lap 3 minutes 29.1,
00:27:04so 4 second differential.
00:27:06Yeah, interesting also that the Peugeot car, the 17, is lapping it around about the same place as Montagnier.
00:27:11We're going to take a short break here on Eurosport, we'll see you in a few moments.
00:27:19Welcome back to Le Mans, live on Eurosport, we're joined by Johnny Molum,
00:27:23and Johnny, we've been watching this GT2 back, we've just seen a pit stop, Jürgen Bergmeister,
00:27:27who was the leader now, you've been in a position leading at Le Mans in your class in the GT,
00:27:32you've also been a winner at Sebring with the recent competition team,
00:27:35so you know all about this kind of situation, what is going to be the significant thing at this stage of the race,
00:27:40for these teams, that's going to be able to get somebody an advantage, do you think?
00:27:44Well, basically you're going to see that there's a big, big fight going on between the Ferraris and the Porsches,
00:27:49and the one thing that the Ferrari seem to have, from what I understand, as an advantage,
00:27:53is they're a little bit lighter on their tyres around here,
00:27:55and their extra temperature's going to be helping them at the moment.
00:27:57The Porsche, on the other hand, not quite as able to double stint as effectively on the tyre,
00:28:02and also with the new pit stop regulations only allowing a certain number, or two men working on two tyres,
00:28:07that obviously is going to be of an advantage to the Ferrari.
00:28:10At this stage, none of those four cars that are in that fight, the two Ferraris and the two Porsches,
00:28:15are going to be able to allow the other an advantage to get away,
00:28:18and obviously the Marc Lieb car, the Felbermeyer Porsche, with Richard Leakes and Marc Lieb,
00:28:22you're going to see, obviously, is out of that mix now, has dropped back,
00:28:25and that was actually one of my favourites for the class victory,
00:28:27but the Ricci team, obviously the year we were leading by three laps, things went wrong,
00:28:32they've since won it last year, they know how to win this, they won't be stressing just yet,
00:28:36they'll just want to stay on the lead lap, and then go racing at about midday tomorrow, I would say.
00:28:40And then we saw those leaders just make a scheduled pit stop,
00:28:43Georg Bergmeyer, as he was leaving the pit lane after making a scheduled stop,
00:28:48on which they just put in fuel, there was no fresh tyres on that number 80 Flying Lizard Porsche,
00:28:54as he was leaving the pit, Pierre Caffer brought the Ricci Competitieri Ferrari on to pit lane,
00:28:59and to a halt, so that is the gap between first and now second,
00:29:04because the second of the Porsches, Patrick Pille, was in a lap earlier,
00:29:08so slightly different strategies there, but I was talking to Mikasalo just before the start of the race,
00:29:13and he was hoping that the Ferraris were going to be able to do one lap more on the tank of fuel than the Porsches,
00:29:20that time around, not the case.
00:29:23No, I think you're right there, it's a very important fuel strategy as well,
00:29:26and obviously what engine mapping we're going to be running,
00:29:28and I remember when we were running there with Ricci Ferrari,
00:29:30we were running a different engine map to actually try and run it a little bit leaner,
00:29:33it's always a dangerous game to play at such a long place where you're on full throttle for so long
00:29:37in terms of looking after the engine to make sure it lasts 24 hours,
00:29:41but if you can get yourself into a position where you can gain an extra lap per stint,
00:29:45that can really put you in the hot seats in terms of being able to win this race.
00:29:49Meanwhile, at the front of the field, there's another 3 minutes 25 lap from Frank Montani,
00:29:54the race leader in car number 8.
00:29:57It's just a stunning pace that he is turning,
00:29:59and at the top of the petrol engine cars, right now it's still number 007,
00:30:03Lola Aston Martin Thomas Enger, now at the wheel of that car,
00:30:07and in second place in the petrol engine division, if you like, an official class,
00:30:11is Enger's teammate Jos Verstappen, who has taken over at the wheel of car number 008,
00:30:17and just a second to say between last time around.
00:30:20Yeah, sorry Jerry.
00:30:21Johnny, I was going to ask you a question there.
00:30:22We talked about the GT Battle, how the Ferrari Porsche work on tyres.
00:30:27That time that Montani's just done, this late into the stint, obviously,
00:30:31he's got a relatively decent set of tyres.
00:30:33I mean, how difficult is it to maintain tyre degradation in a prototype compared to a GT car?
00:30:39It's actually a lot easier, especially when you're running on Michelins,
00:30:42because the car's got so much more downforce,
00:30:44you're less likely to slide the tyre in a prototype than you are on a GT car,
00:30:47so in that way, it's actually easier to look after the tyres.
00:30:50The fact that Paginot's just done that, and he's also set his fastest sector time,
00:30:54and the fastest sector time of that car in the race so far,
00:30:57and done a 27.5, it also just points to sheer talent.
00:31:00I've raced against Simon Paginot in the American Le Mans Series,
00:31:02we raced with De Ferrand Motorsports,
00:31:04and that boy is just a very quick, very talented driver.
00:31:08And meanwhile, we've got a glimpse there of the 008 Aston Martin,
00:31:11that once again was having a bit of trouble leaving its pit name,
00:31:14just looking out of the booth to see that,
00:31:16but that was Jos Verstappen making his pit stop right on schedule,
00:31:20and they're doing 12 laps per stint,
00:31:23it would appear right now in the low-light Aston Martin,
00:31:26and here is a couple of the Peugeots.
00:31:29It'll be interesting to see exactly what the relative pace is between these two cars,
00:31:33the factory, the newer car, and of course last year's car,
00:31:36the privateer car of the Pescarolo team.
00:31:39So that will give us a bit of an indication to,
00:31:41as Johnny said, doubtlessly there's a huge amount of talent in all of the cars,
00:31:45but Paginot is certainly one of those drivers you think,
00:31:47won't be long before you can see him being full-time factory,
00:31:50not just in the part-time role that he's been sometimes.
00:31:53And both of those two are going very, very quickly.
00:31:55Montani is a race who has now put two laps on the private Pescarolo run car of Siwa Paginot,
00:32:01but as you say, Paginot turning his best lap in that car so far,
00:32:05that car's best lap so far in this race,
00:32:073 minutes 27.5 on the 46th last lap.
00:32:11That's probably one of the reasons he's just done his fastest lap,
00:32:13because I tell you what, nothing makes you dig that little bit deeper
00:32:16when someone comes up to lap you and it happens to be the leader
00:32:18and he's in the same car theoretically as you.
00:32:21Yeah, you want to prove a point, you know,
00:32:23it's interesting hearing the drivers playing this little blind game
00:32:25and Audi and Peugeot, we're not bothered about Paul, we're not doing that.
00:32:28And then Alan Munish after said,
00:32:30that's rubbish, I'm a racing driver, I want to get the fastest guy out there.
00:32:32Absolutely, absolutely, you couldn't have said it better
00:32:34and I think the fact that you're seeing Audi,
00:32:36the way they react, the way they look after their drivers,
00:32:38the way the drivers are basically all happy with their own little pecking order
00:32:42and also moving that forward.
00:32:44They look to Alan, not probably in terms of speed as a team leader,
00:32:46but Tom and Dindo incredibly good and incredibly gifted at certain areas, other strengths.
00:32:51Peugeot on the other hand, you always get that feeling
00:32:53that they're fighting each other so hard,
00:32:55sometimes they lose a little bit of sight of what the real objective is here.
00:32:59I'm not sure that's the case right now.
00:33:01I think that's something they've worked very, very hard on over the winter
00:33:03as we see the LAP2 class leading car of Casper Elgard
00:33:07and the GT1 class leader, Johnny O'Connell, I believe, is in the wheel of car number 63.
00:33:13But just back to what you were saying there about how competitive the drivers are,
00:33:16at the end of that qualifying session on Thursday night
00:33:19was Tom Christensen who drove the final stint in car number one.
00:33:23He didn't have an opportunity to go on to qualifying tyres
00:33:26to try and beat the time that Stefan Sarazen had put in
00:33:29with only 11 minutes to go.
00:33:31And Alan McNish, we saw him about an hour after qualifying,
00:33:35so about one o'clock in the morning,
00:33:37and he was just looking daggers at everything,
00:33:39and he was not a happy funny.
00:33:41And hey, he's only qualifying, and the team had said all along,
00:33:44you know, we're not worried about qualifying,
00:33:46but as you go back to what you were saying,
00:33:48it certainly mattered to Alan McNish.
00:33:50Absolutely, and then Peugeot said when they went to Sebring,
00:33:53they weren't interested in winning Sebring, weren't they?
00:33:55This was a test for Le Mans.
00:33:56But if you talk to Nick Minassian, you know full well,
00:33:59they're racing drivers.
00:34:00If they get told to slow down, they will slow down,
00:34:02because that's what they're being paid to do.
00:34:04But until you tell them to slow down, they will drive as fast as they can,
00:34:07and they want to win.
00:34:08I think the point that Gerry made about how hard they've been working is,
00:34:12we look at the overall classification,
00:34:13you see that lap lead that the Peugeot's got.
00:34:16That's not quite, it's not a full lap lead they have,
00:34:19but as they came across, at the time this came across,
00:34:23it was a lap ahead.
00:34:24It's actually not a full lap lead,
00:34:25but it's just a bit over two minutes between first and second,
00:34:28but the two Peugeot's first and second,
00:34:30car number eight and car number nine,
00:34:32then the two Audis, car numbers one and two,
00:34:34and I think they're the only four cars on the lead lap,
00:34:38and then the two Lola Aston Martins,
00:34:40the 007 and the 008 are in fifth and sixth overall,
00:34:44so certainly an excellent performance by the ProDrive team there.
00:34:48Yeah, we always knew that probably they were going to be the petrol pace,
00:34:52as it were.
00:34:53I know it's probably quite confusing.
00:34:54If you haven't been following sports car racing regularly,
00:34:57we keep talking about the petrol and the diesel class.
00:34:59It's just such a massive difference.
00:35:01Now, Johnny, you've obviously raced the petrol prototypes
00:35:03an awful lot in America and in Europe as well.
00:35:05I've been doing some work, I know, with the Geneta Zytek recently,
00:35:08some test and development work.
00:35:09What do you think is the real thing?
00:35:11Is it just simple, straightforward, all-round better packaging,
00:35:14or is there more to it than that with the diesel cars?
00:35:16I think a lot of it is that you've got the two best teams probably,
00:35:19or the two certainly best-funded sports car teams in the world at the moment
00:35:23developing the diesel, and that has a large part of it.
00:35:25If they were developing the petrol and everyone else was on the diesel,
00:35:28they'd probably still be winning.
00:35:29But having said that, the torque and the general horsepower effects of that diesel
00:35:34and the regulations that were in place that made them,
00:35:37and obviously encouraged them into that,
00:35:39obviously some of it's marketing as well,
00:35:40but the competitive rules that allow them to come in
00:35:43and make a diesel be that competitive and have that much extra power and torque
00:35:46than everyone else is why, basically, those cars are winning.
00:35:49And don't forget that Audi and Peugeot, basically,
00:35:51at the end of the day when they had that blank piece of paper
00:35:53and they wanted to design and build a race car,
00:35:55they wanted to build it to win this particular race
00:35:58that we're commentating on right now.
00:35:59And there's a great shot of Frontmartini going around the outside
00:36:03of that Krone Rissi Competizione Ferrari through the Porsche curves,
00:36:06and it's very difficult to get offline there, Johnny.
00:36:09It's so dirty offline through the Porsche curves.
00:36:12And that last left-hand corner there,
00:36:14if you get a little bit offline, like no more than a foot,
00:36:16it just sucks you out and there's a concrete wall just waiting for you.
00:36:20But Frank Montagny, he is in the zone, isn't he?
00:36:22Absolutely, yes.
00:36:23But he is absolutely flying.
00:36:24Last time around, at 3 minutes 27,
00:36:26he goes across and passing one of the Luc Alfon,
00:36:29Alvanchor Corvettes, even passing on that traffic,
00:36:31a 3.29 point one for Frank Montagny.
00:36:34Marc Genay in second place, his last lap, at 3.33.
00:36:39Alan McNish in third place, at 3 minutes 31.
00:36:42The gap from first to second now is out to 2.
00:36:452.5 minutes.
00:36:47Yeah, well it's interesting actually,
00:36:48just as you were saying that, Jeremy,
00:36:49I was watching that brilliant shot that we had of Montagny going through,
00:36:52and Johnny will understand this as a racing driver,
00:36:54you can see the attitude of the car, it's so planted,
00:36:57he's getting on the power, making the aero work,
00:36:59making the tyres work, and that element of being in the zone,
00:37:02he's dealing with the traffic in a really systematic way,
00:37:04but it also seems to be in a point where he hasn't got anything in his mind
00:37:09that's going to clutter his objective.
00:37:10This is going to get interesting.
00:37:11Stefan Sarrazan, the fastest man at Le Mans for the last three years,
00:37:15is going to take over that car.
00:37:16Now how fast will it go?
00:37:18See, this is where I actually think that Jeremy still might be slightly wrong,
00:37:22and that I think, I may be wrong in saying this,
00:37:25but I think Stefan Sarrazan will be standing watching that screen,
00:37:28he'll have seen that 25.1, and he'll be thinking,
00:37:31I'm going to go in, and I'm going to do a 24-something.
00:37:33Yeah.
00:37:34Whereas I can guarantee you that Dindo is waiting to get in the car that Alan's about to come in,
00:37:38and we saw our shot on camera there,
00:37:40he won't give a monkey's about that 29.1 that Alan's done,
00:37:43he will get in there, do the best job he can with what he's got underneath him,
00:37:47and that is why I think Audi still have an advantage over Peugeot at a 24-hour race like this.
00:37:51It's also interesting with Peugeot, just to finish that point,
00:37:54that it looks to me like they've got the three fastest drivers in one car,
00:37:58which hasn't always been the case with them in the past.
00:38:00That could be very, very significant in terms of,
00:38:03if they are all knowing that they are the three fastest drivers,
00:38:06is it even more competitive, or do they have a little bit more of,
00:38:09okay, guys, collectively, we can have Le Croix de France if we do our job right.
00:38:13Well, it's interesting you say that, because both the No. 7 and No. 8 Peugeots,
00:38:18their best laps have been a 3 minutes 25-something.
00:38:21The No. 9 car, Marc Genet, a 3 minutes 26-something.
00:38:25All three of the factory Audi R10, R15 TDIs,
00:38:29have done a 3 minutes 29.106 for McNish, 29.136 for the car No. 2,
00:38:35and 29.760 for car No. 3.
00:38:38They're all very closely matched, each of those two factory teams,
00:38:41and there is that four-second margin, which seems to be on a regular, consistent basis.
00:38:47Absolutely, this is what I said right back at the beginning when I came on air with you guys,
00:38:50is that I really am worried about that, because it seems to me that Peugeot have enough in their pocket,
00:38:54as we see the... I think that must be our leader coming in.
00:38:58I think that's the 8 car. That's the 9 car.
00:39:00It is. It's the 9 car.
00:39:019 car.
00:39:02How a mistake. Yeah, 9 car.
00:39:03So that's the second-place car, Marc Genet.
00:39:05We're going to see a driver change now. Let's have a look.
00:39:07Yes, he is. He's broken the drive-brake on his drinks bottle.
00:39:10He's taken the radio out, pops himself out of the car, slides away.
00:39:17Watch with interest. Who's going to be taking that car over?
00:39:19It's David Brabham.
00:39:20As you see, Alan McNish also pitting there.
00:39:22Literally, we saw Dindo waiting a little bit earlier,
00:39:25and obviously, Alan, you can see him there loosening his belts as he's coming in.
00:39:29He can't obviously loosen them too much, and he certainly can't undo them until he's stationary,
00:39:33but he can certainly get things organised, as Simon was saying earlier.
00:39:35Get your drinks bottle sorted, get your radio plug out,
00:39:37and on top of your helmet, a little bit of Velcro they placed there to put your radio plug.
00:39:43Now, let's watch this. We talked about the choreography of the pit stop,
00:39:46and I wonder if there's been a little bit of gamesmanship
00:39:49where each of the top teams have been watching what the others are doing
00:39:52and coming up with some ideas.
00:39:54Oh, you can bet you're going to go on that side of the hill.
00:39:56These teams watch each other like Hawks.
00:39:58They'll have spotters up in the grandstand,
00:40:00or maybe even closer than that,
00:40:02to see exactly what the other teams are doing.
00:40:05Now, this is our race leader, and this is significant.
00:40:07Let's watch to see if this stop goes smoothly.
00:40:10If everything goes to plan,
00:40:11there's every reason to suggest this car's going to come back out
00:40:13and just do exactly what the outgoing driver from Montaigne has been doing,
00:40:18Sarrazan on board.
00:40:19As we said, he has been Mr. Le Mans for the last three years.
00:40:22He's been on pole position,
00:40:23and he's been able to pull times out of nowhere.
00:40:25Remember in the race last year,
00:40:27he was lapping within a second of his pole time.
00:40:29To follow that point that you made, Johnny,
00:40:32therefore, we could quite possibly see him doing low 24s, high 23s.
00:40:36If he needs to.
00:40:37If he needs to.
00:40:38He doesn't need to because he's way out in front,
00:40:40and once again, both of these two cars have done 13 laps
00:40:44since their last pit stop.
00:40:46You see, if I was a team manager on the pit ball
00:40:48and he even got close to a 23,
00:40:49I would be shouting at him so loud
00:40:51that he wouldn't know where to hit him.
00:40:52Yeah, you're exactly right, Johnny.
00:40:54He just doesn't need to go that fast.
00:40:56There is Dindo Capello rejoining after taking over
00:41:00the number one car from Alan McNish.
00:41:02So that's the first driver change to that car in this race.
00:41:05And Ditto...
00:41:06Almost a lap.
00:41:07Almost a lap.
00:41:08Exactly.
00:41:09Incredible stuff.
00:41:10The interesting thing, I suppose,
00:41:11you could always think that because of modern sports car racing
00:41:14being the flat-out sprint that it is compared to where it used to be,
00:41:18having to look after the car, etc.
00:41:20Could there be an element where they're saying,
00:41:22it is all or nothing, guys.
00:41:23We want you to go flat out.
00:41:24We want you to push that hard.
00:41:26Is that a strategy you think they might risk, Johnny?
00:41:28At this level at the front, they do push as hard as they can.
00:41:30I think Peugeot perhaps got a little bit left as we keep saying,
00:41:33Audi, I can guarantee you are flat out all the time.
00:41:42So welcome to everybody that's just joined us across the Eurosport channels
00:41:46to an enthralling Le Mans.
00:41:48We've just seen a very significant couple of pit stops.
00:41:50We've seen the number eight, the leading car that you can see there,
00:41:53just taken over by Stefan Sarrazan, our pole position man.
00:41:56And it's going to be interesting to see what lap times he can produce
00:42:00compared to the outgoing driver, Frank Montani, Jeremy Shaw.
00:42:04And that classification or so is slightly misleading
00:42:07because, in fact, the top three cars are still on the lead lap.
00:42:11It's just that when that graphic came up, Sarrazan had completed lap 51
00:42:15and David Bradham, who's just taken over the wheel of car number nine,
00:42:19had not completed that lap.
00:42:20So, in fact, there's a gap of about two and a half minutes
00:42:23between car number eight, with which we are on board right now,
00:42:27coming into the first chicane on the Mont-Saint Strait,
00:42:30and the second-place car of David Bradham, car number nine.
00:42:35And DiBio Capello is the only other car on the lead lap in third place
00:42:38in car number one, the first of the Audi.
00:42:41Johnny, another point.
00:42:42We were talking about how the relative development of the two cars,
00:42:45obviously the 908, very evolved over the last three years.
00:42:48Absolutely, yes.
00:42:49And you talked about the way the drivers can push that hard.
00:42:51Do you think it's because they know the car so well,
00:42:53and also the car is so well-developed,
00:42:55they've managed to iron out any of the nastiness of the car,
00:42:57whereas the Audi may still have a few little habits
00:42:59that the drivers still haven't quite understood,
00:43:01so they have to give themselves a bit of room.
00:43:03Absolutely, absolutely.
00:43:04And the Peugeot has evolved.
00:43:05It's not so much the drivers, you know, getting more up to grips with the car.
00:43:08The car has been developed for this track, really sorted,
00:43:11and it really feels hooked up for them.
00:43:12The R15, on the other hand, similar to the R10 in its early stages.
00:43:16Don't forget, still the diesel, still got the catalytic converter out the back,
00:43:19a little bit tail-heavy, they're still unlocking that car's full potential.
00:43:23Peugeot have the advantage, there's no doubt.
00:43:25That is a very new car from Audi, isn't it?
00:43:27The engine is different, the chassis concept is different,
00:43:30they've gone from a V12 engine to a V10, just everything is different.
00:43:34And it's a huge learning curve, isn't it?
00:43:36We've come in with a brand new car.
00:43:37Absolutely, and the aero is obviously different, as we know,
00:43:40from the saga that's going on now.
00:43:41It'll be interesting for David Bradman, first time in this car, in the Le Mans 24 hours.
00:43:45He'll be quite excited right now about driving.
00:43:47He will be. He's had a few challenging moments this weekend.
00:43:50Jonny, have you spoken to David about his experience so far?
00:43:53I haven't actually seen, I saw him at Salt Lake City
00:43:55after he'd had his first run at the Spa Le Mans Series race.
00:43:58I haven't actually seen him much here other than just to wave at him as we went past,
00:44:01passing ships in the night, so to speak.
00:44:03But I know he's been very looking forward to a real chance to fight for an overall victory,
00:44:07which he's not had since his Bentley days.
00:44:09Yeah, I saw him just before the start of the race,
00:44:11and he was loving every minute of this experience
00:44:13and just couldn't wait to get to the wheel of that car.
00:44:15We've got, here we are, the second of the Audis.
00:44:18He came in in second place as a result of making his pit stop after the car number nine and car number one.
00:44:25And you can see they're on a slightly different time strategy there,
00:44:27because obviously Werner stayed in then, they didn't change Chaya's fuel only,
00:44:30but obviously previously Alan came in and Dinda Capello got in,
00:44:33and obviously driver change, obviously changed tyres,
00:44:35that's normally the strategy when you're doing a driver change is to change the tyres as well.
00:44:39So you can see that those two cars, the number two and the number one Audi,
00:44:42are actually on slightly different strategies in terms of their tyre management right now,
00:44:46and also their driver changes.
00:44:48The Pescarello Sport Peugeot, or Seymour Pagina, just made a pit stop,
00:44:53and interesting to me, he managed only 12 laps on that stint,
00:44:56as in fact he has done on just about every stint so far.
00:44:59in car number 17, whereas the factory car makes 13 laps on a pit stop.
00:45:06Yeah, maybe that's relating to the drag factor with the different aero package between the two cars.
00:45:10Exactly right, Johnny Marlowe, I think that's a very good point,
00:45:12because the car that the Pescarello Sport team is running is a year old car,
00:45:17it does not have all the latest updates that the factory cars do have.
00:45:22It's interesting watching the way that Sarrazan is dealing with the traffic,
00:45:27it doesn't seem to have any sort of hesitation, so certainly that logic that we had of pushing hard seems to be very much the case.
00:45:35So live on Eurosport 2, we continue to watch the enthralling battle throughout the class,
00:45:44it's one of the GT2 cars, the Modena Motorsport car, another famous name in there,
00:45:49Leo Mansell, the oldest son of, of course, Nigel Mansell.
00:45:52So we have the name Senna Prost and Mansell racing at Le Mans, which is a great thing for us Anoraks, isn't it, Jeremy?
00:45:58It is very cool, isn't it?
00:46:00Nigel, I saw Nigel, but he seemed to talk to him, unfortunately, but Nigel Mansell is here this weekend watching the race,
00:46:05and it's our great brother, Greg Mansell, younger brother of Leo, is routing a World Series race this weekend.
00:46:11That's our Nag, I believe.
00:46:13We're trying to see which car that is, it's like one of the LMP2 cars.
00:46:17You can see the number at the moment, unfortunately.
00:46:20It's a Zaytac, I think, isn't it?
00:46:23Is that the 40 car?
00:46:24Yes, it is.
00:46:25Is that guy Smith on board at the moment?
00:46:28I think it may well be.
00:46:30Let's have a look.
00:46:31Didn't look like his helmet.
00:46:32He has a very bright fluorescent yellow helmet, guys.
00:46:35No, that's Amaral.
00:46:36Amaral, wow.
00:46:37Yeah, he just outbraked himself, I think, going to that corner.
00:46:41I should recognise the side of a Zaytac by now, shouldn't I?
00:46:44He did well there, actually, to decide not to keep on turning, otherwise he'd have hit that barrier.
00:46:50I actually was speaking to Nigel Mansell and Leo yesterday, actually.
00:46:53He's obviously very, very excited to get his first laps in, albeit the first laps he ever did were in the dark and the wet.
00:46:58Nigel really, really excited about potentially racing here at some point in the future, so watch that space, I think.
00:47:03He seems to be doing quite a lot of jumping in various different cars at the moment.
00:47:07He's done some stuff recently, and it's good to see the guy back out there.
00:47:11We talked about Sena, here is Bruno Sena, who's had a difficult start to sports car crew with a big shunt at Spa a little while ago, but seems to be in a nice groove at the moment.
00:47:20He's really tired after the stint.
00:47:23He says he's really tired after the stint in the car.
00:47:29It's been pretty tiring after two and a half hours in the car.
00:47:34We're trying hard to get a really big lead.
00:47:46I've managed to make up one minute whilst I was in the car.
00:47:50I don't know, it was my strategy at the beginning.
00:47:53It's very difficult to...
00:47:55So the strategy was it to do long stints?
00:47:58He said I'm not too sure whether our strategy is that way or not.
00:48:02Of course we'll have to adapt the strategy as the race progresses.
00:48:07But for the moment, everything is fine?
00:48:11Yes, it's fine.
00:48:12We've also got to take care of the car as well as think about your pace strategy.
00:48:16Thanks, Franck.
00:48:18Well, you know, if that's taking it steady, I don't know what going front out is, Jonny Mohler.
00:48:22What do you think?
00:48:23No, I think he's saying all the right things, isn't he? There's no doubt about it.
00:48:26And Franck Montagne is very, very talented, very, very quick driver.
00:48:29And don't forget, he's done a fair amount of sports car racing now.
00:48:32And I think when he first came in, he was hitting a few things he shouldn't have hit,
00:48:36but he's definitely out of that zone now and he fully understands, I think,
00:48:39what it takes to go out and try and do well at this race.
00:48:42Yeah, the race impressed me most was the race he did with James Rossiter last year in the States.
00:48:46And very impressive jumping and get on with it in a very good car, let's be fair.
00:48:50But, of course, any top-line driver needs that underneath him.
00:48:53Now, at the moment, we're watching with interest to see how the leader deals with the traffic.
00:48:57We are going to be taking a very short break here on Eurosport.
00:49:00We'll see you very soon.
00:49:02Welcome back to Le Mans and Eurosport.
00:49:07And we are looking at the 008 car, the Jos Verstappen car,
00:49:10which has just moved into fifth position as we look at a pit stop now for the 12 car,
00:49:16which is the Signature Plus car being run by the guys that have been involved.
00:49:23Saulnier's operation, of course, have been involved in other things.
00:49:26The Signature, of course, very famous for their single-seater exploits.
00:49:29Pierre Rags was in, finished third last year in his class.
00:49:32So, he's got a lot of experience of it.
00:49:35And Frank Mayer, interesting young French driver.
00:49:37A lot of French talent out there.
00:49:38It's almost like going back to the 80s and the 70s with all these great French guys around,
00:49:42as we see a problem for the Team China entry.
00:49:45That's the second time that car has had a problem.
00:49:49It was a puncture last time.
00:49:51The way that car seems to be wobbling,
00:49:52it might have another puncture possibly on the right rear, Johnny.
00:49:54Yeah, it doesn't look as if it's...
00:49:57It doesn't look as if it's...
00:49:59Something's not happening in the suspension.
00:50:01Yeah, absolutely.
00:50:02I don't know.
00:50:03If it is, it's right rear or right front.
00:50:06But I think it might be the right rear.
00:50:07Certainly, like you say, it doesn't look particularly healthy, does it?
00:50:10And that's the Bulgarian.
00:50:11I believe that's actually the Bulgarian Tourism Minister, isn't it?
00:50:13Or something.
00:50:14I believe he's involved in something to do with the government.
00:50:17Well, there.
00:50:18We were talking about our politicians having some interesting use of funds.
00:50:21So, it's obviously something potentially going on.
00:50:24Let me take that as a logic.
00:50:26I'm going to have lots of nasty Bulgarian men after me now.
00:50:28I've said that.
00:50:29Hopefully not.
00:50:30Only a joke, chaps.
00:50:31I've had a bit of a trying time this weekend.
00:50:34These guys haven't really managed to get on top of Le Mans this weekend.
00:50:38And we see...
00:50:39This is the Amaral car that we still have the problem earlier.
00:50:42Yeah, that's come back.
00:50:43Made it back to the pit lane.
00:50:44Has Miguel Amaral and...
00:50:46Probably flat spotted his tyres, I would say.
00:50:48That's something as you see them changing all four tyres there.
00:50:51Here's a replay of what happened a little while ago.
00:50:54Just locking up the brakes, as Johnny Mollum said.
00:50:56Go down into Arnard's turn and wisely decided just to go straight on to the barrier.
00:51:00Just nose very, very lightly into that tyre wall.
00:51:03Shouldn't be any significant damage there.
00:51:05There will be no damage.
00:51:06It's just literally some 50p tyres on it and then they have to change that and he'll be on his way.
00:51:11You're talking how tricky Arnard is in terms of getting the line of the braking etc.
00:51:16Is there anything to do with the fact you've been at such high speed for so long maybe the brakes were a bit cold going in there?
00:51:20I don't think it's that so much because you've had quite a heavy braking area with your fast right Indianapolis and you've got a very tight left immediately after.
00:51:26And you're hard on the brakes there.
00:51:28I think what it is is it's a combination of surface change there.
00:51:31Also the cars stop for the junction road cars on this public road there.
00:51:34And there's a lot of oil and various things that build up over time.
00:51:37And I think the other thing really is that it's actually such a slow corner that you always think you're braking a bit too early for it.
00:51:43And then as soon as you try and brake a little bit later you suddenly find that you actually weren't braking too early after all.
00:51:48We've got the third place LMP2 car on pit lane just leaving pit lane at the moment.
00:51:54Mike Newton has actually dropped to fourth now.
00:51:56Mike Newton at the wheel of the RML Lola.
00:51:59You just see a flash of him there at the side of the screen as Caspar Elgar the class leader in the Team Essex Porsche RX Spider.
00:52:08There he goes through the underneath the Dunlop bridge one more time.
00:52:12This is the lap 52 for the class leader.
00:52:17And Seiji Ara in the Team Go Porsche RX Spider is only about six or seven seconds behind him on the road.
00:52:24If we hold that camera angle for a moment or two we could probably see him.
00:52:27But not quite the case.
00:52:29But certainly it's still a very close battle in LMP2 as Caspar Elgar goes on to the model sign straight one more time.
00:52:37How significant could this be Johnny do you think when we see driver changes for these two cars?
00:52:41We know Ara is extremely quick. We know Sasha Masson is extremely quick. Caspar Elgar.
00:52:46But Christian Paulson and Kunimoto we don't really know as much about in this situation.
00:52:51Well Kunimoto, sorry to interrupt Johnny, but Kunimoto is a talent.
00:52:54I mean he's a young man who's just 20 years of age but he won Macau last year.
00:52:57Yes.
00:52:58If you can win the Macau Grand Prix in Formula 3 Johnny Mullen you're pretty good.
00:53:01Oh absolutely. But one thing that I've learned and sometimes the hard way is when you're coming out of single-seaters into something like sports cars is it isn't about pace.
00:53:08Yep.
00:53:09You obviously have to be fast, you have to have the ability to lap quickly but you have to have so much more else going for you in your armoury in order to be able to deliver on every level in terms of keeping the car as strong and healthy.
00:53:21There's no point going out there and smoking the car doing incredible quick laps coming in and having your co-driver get into a car that's falling apart on you.
00:53:27Yeah, but Sasha Masson who's sharing that car with the Team Go drivers, two Japanese drivers, Sasha was up here a couple of nights ago and he was telling us how impressed he was with Keisuke Kunimoto.
00:53:40I mean the kid is not only fast and bright, he's a very sensible young man as well.
00:53:45The Japanese mentality in my experience is very much they're very much willing to learn and listen and Sasha Masson very experienced especially in that car.
00:53:53And he will be a perfect person to show them how to unlock the potential of a car in order to win Le Mans.
00:54:00There is Seiji Aro, former winner here overall for Team Go back in 2004 in one of the Audi R8 wasn't it, thank you pardon, the R8 of course before the diesel powered cars came along.
00:54:15But Seiji a massive amount of experience as you said a race winner here and now trying to chase down that leader in LMP2.
00:54:22He's running in second place at the moment, the two Porsche RX Spiders clearly the class of the field.
00:54:27Last time around their lap times, Seiji Aro was a couple of seconds quicker than Kasper Elgar.
00:54:34Of course Elgar did have quite a lot of traffic on that lap, we saw the beginning of that, you were saying you could almost see them in the shot, that was very very significant.
00:54:41Of course we were in this exact same position this time last year, these two cars.
00:54:45Last year it was the Vermeerstein Porsche as opposed to the Team Go car but it was the same car, slightly different organisation and the Essex team.
00:54:53Interestingly of course, Sasha Masson has gone from one team to the other so let's hope he's got his guessing right and got the right one at the right year.
00:54:59Absolutely, actually my first ever Le Mans that I did here was back in 2000, I actually drove, my team mates were David Murray and Sasha Masson.
00:55:06It was Sasha Masson obviously his first Le Mans as well and so ever since then we've been good friends.
00:55:11We've been good friends and again a really really good guy and very sensible and totally understands how this race works.
00:55:18We see one of the CompuWeb Corvettes, a 64 car coming in.
00:55:23That's the second place car in GT1.
00:55:25Again those two cars were split up by the pace car earlier on so they've been running about a minute and a half or more apart and they've pretty much stayed that way ever since Simon.
00:55:35Well again, referring back to last year we had that wonderful scrap between Corvette and Aston Martin and between two Corvettes, two Aston Martins swapping around.
00:55:43Obviously no factory Aston Martins in this category this year but doubtlessly these two guys, a lot of the guys that are involved in this Corvette programme have been involved in that programme for a long time and we've said before this is the last time we're going to see this particular configuration of team, driver etc.
00:55:59And you know a lot of the guys there Johnny.
00:56:01I do actually, I saw that I was down there with Dan Binks who's in charge of the 64 car and I just said to him, you know, a bit emotional really, this is the last time GT1, are you a bit emotional buddy?
00:56:11He just said no, that was it.
00:56:12You know, at the end of the day they're there to win.
00:56:15Obviously they've got their GT2 programme which will kick off back in the American Le Mans series but right now all they're thinking about is going out on top with a win and you have to say that they are complete and utter favourites for this as you rightly say with no Prodrive Aston Martins up against them.
00:56:28And here coming into Amalsan corner are the leaders there in GT2, the Flying Lizard Porsche car number 80, now with Jörg Bergmeister still at the wheel and right behind him and about to make a pass is, there he goes he pulling out to the right hand side as they race away toward Indianapolis is the class leading car number 63 Johnny O'Connell is still up in that car.
00:56:52And again that scrap, we talked about it earlier, the GT2 is only 5 seconds between Bergmeister and the number 80 car, the Flying Lizards car and the 76 Imza Matmut car with currently with Patrick Pillay on board.
00:57:04And we saw those cars pit a lap apart in that last sequence, you'll see whether that is significant but that gap certainly, you can see the gap there from first to second.
00:57:12Behind the Corvette immediately was Jörg Bergmeister and only just a few seconds back up the road is the second place car in GT2 Patrick Pillay.
00:57:21Former teammates last year, you can see them there, the Corvette, then the first the Porsche to the Flying Lizard car, the silver and red car of Jörg Bergmeister and just about on the top of the picture there, the white and red Porsche in third, second place in GT2.
00:57:36Now Johnny, you're looking at the timing screen and looking with interest at the times that Dindo Capello is doing in the number one car.
00:57:42Yeah, I just noticed that Dindo is only about 6, 7 tenths off of Alan McNish's best time so far in the 29, 29, 8.
00:57:48Werner on the other hand and of course like you rightly said before, you never know with traffic, this can ebb and flow a lot with the traffic but 31.4 so Dindo pulling Werner back in, he's got the gap down to less than 8 seconds.
00:57:59Yeah, I've been watching that and it's been some nip and tuck between those two and interestingly Stefan Saratyn taken over from Frank Montagne in car number 8, the race leader.
00:58:09He's settling into a rhythm there around about 3 minutes 29, 3 minutes 30, so he's not, as you feared, rising to the challenge.
00:58:17No, they finally may be getting it right, they may be sussed it.
00:58:20The team's a wonderful thing, is it looking at the other of the cars, interestingly on our timing screen, the number 3 car which is the one that had problems early on with Alex Prema on board,
00:58:29it's just being shown on our screen as Audi R15 TDI, it's not showing a driver.
00:58:33Obviously, we know it's out there somewhere but it's not showing it so obviously there's been some interesting things with regards to various different timing issues.
00:58:42There's a 63 Corvette comes in, significant stop.
00:58:50Welcome back live to Le Mans on Eurosport 2.
00:58:52You're looking at, well, one of the Zytec's, Ginetta Zytec's diving between our GT2 lead battle.
00:58:59Those two Porsches with a Ferrari between them now.
00:59:01Jörg Bergmeister for Flying Lizards.
00:59:03Patrick Long for the IMSA Matmut Performance team.
00:59:07And that is first and second in GT2 and Long leaving trademark dark black stripes.
00:59:13Patrick Long leaving long dark stripes there as he reels in the car in front.
00:59:18The GT2 class lead was 1.9 seconds at the beginning of the lap and it is comfortably less than that.
00:59:25That's got to be a second closer.
00:59:27Patrick Long coming in very quickly.
00:59:29Bergmeister's last lap, 4 minute 10.1, 4 minute 7.0.
00:59:35In fact, it's showing Patrick Pillay going quicker again.
00:59:38He's within a second of the car's fastest lap time.
00:59:41I do think we're going to have to count out the Team China entry as the Jet Alliance car backs it off into the gravel trap.
00:59:47But that GT lead, the battle, Jeremy Shaw, is going to be joined any second.
00:59:52And at the moment the car came up from behind the IMSA Matmut Porsche has the head of steam.
00:59:57I'll turn you, Michael.
00:59:59He certainly does, doesn't he?
01:00:00Because their fastest laps overall, those two cars, within two tenths of a second.
01:00:04As you said last time around, Patrick Pillay was a good bit quicker than Jörg Bergmeister.
01:00:09And that is a shot again of Thomas Gruber losing control under braking in the Jet Alliance Aston Martin and depositing it in the gravel track.
01:00:19Yeah, we picked up that just as the talent was leaving the cockpit for a moment there, didn't we?
01:00:23I think it had just gone for a holiday, that talent, didn't it?
01:00:25But anyway, it could have well been quite often in these cars.
01:00:28If you're coming into the corner as you bang down through the gear,
01:00:31it's very, very easy to just lock the rears on a downshift quite easily.
01:00:34Also, sometimes as the stints go on, you find the drivers will be adjusting the brake bias,
01:00:38maybe winding a little bit more to the front or to the rear, and that could be significant.
01:00:42And here is the garage, waiting for their man to come in.
01:00:44It's always a problem for the mechanics, they've probably only just taken their sweaty gear off,
01:00:48and they're getting it back on in there under their chandelier, of course.
01:00:51Well, they've already had a couple of long stops too.
01:00:53They lost 14 laps very early in a race, they've lost another 20 since then.
01:00:58So they've had a disappointing race that showed all the way down in 54th place.
01:01:03They've completed not very many laps, only 23 laps, so they've had a tough time already.
01:01:09Meantime, let's get back to the quote-unquote battle at the front of the field.
01:01:14It's still Stefan Sarrazan who leads, he's lapping very consistently now,
01:01:18in around about 3 minutes 29 or so.
01:01:21The gap from number 8 Sarrazan to number 9 Brabham, 2 minutes 30.8,
01:01:27that's almost exactly as a couple of seconds more than it was about 15 minutes ago.
01:01:32The gap then back to Marco Werner in third place has extended just a little bit as well,
01:01:38and the gap back to Dindo Capello in fourth place is down is also about 2 seconds more than it was 15 minutes ago.
01:01:47So 3 minutes and 9 seconds now Capello is behind Stefan Sarrazan,
01:01:52so kind of within certainly half a minute of going a lap down.
01:01:57Well that shows the pace of the Peugeot still if we're, what we've got still 20 and a half hours left,
01:02:04and they're just about to put a lap on the second best placed Audi,
01:02:07which means he will a lap to everybody except podium sitting cars,
01:02:11and that's a terrifying prospect for Audi, that the Peugeot has got that much pace and they don't at the moment,
01:02:17and in the Audi camp seem to have an answer.
01:02:19Particularly as the Audi and the Peugeot seem to be going about the same amount on the tank of fuel,
01:02:25that is a surprise, a change from one year ago.
01:02:28I mean this brand new R15 TDI, as we see the Drayson, Drayson car come into,
01:02:35made a GT2 car, Johnny Cocker and Lord Drayson and Marino Frank Kitty share in that car,
01:02:40and that is I think a routine piece of the running, very respectively it has to be said,
01:02:457th place in GT2 Martin Haven.
01:02:47Drive a change, looks like that's Marino in, brother Dario is here this weekend as well,
01:02:52we'd get him up to talk, but he can't talk, he couldn't talk much when he arrived,
01:02:56and he's on a stag party with a lot of jocks, so you can imagine him talking even less now.
01:03:01Julien Jus, Formula 2 racer has just stepped out of the car, hello to everybody at Bedford Aerodrome,
01:03:07who are wishing him well, let's find out how his first ever stint at Le Mans has been going.
01:03:12Julien Jus, everything going well with the car in your first trip around Le Mans?
01:03:22No, it's dreadful, yeah, no, everything's fine, very happy with the car,
01:03:29we're in third position at the moment, and so we're the lead of the half-en-arment tour cars,
01:03:36we're lapping pretty consistently,
01:03:40and Sammy Pompidou has now gone out in the car, so,
01:03:46at the moment in third place, it's about as much as we can expect,
01:03:54it's impossible to fight with the factory cars,
01:03:57and we'll be very happy, if we can stay where we are, of course, we'll be in third place on the podium.
01:04:02Janetta Zajtek has just bounced off the wall, this is Miguel Amaral, he's only just come back out of the pits,
01:04:08having bounced off the wall once already at Arnage, and that's a little more of a high-speed off,
01:04:16and, of course, it's Xavier Masson, not Xavier Pompidou, in that third place GT1 car,
01:04:22and whatever ails the Amaral car, still ails it, and you're suspecting,
01:04:28I would think, perhaps, that he's just got an intermittent brake pedal,
01:04:32easy for me to say,
01:04:34well, that's still an intermittent brake problem,
01:04:40what I heard once referred to as an organic problem,
01:04:44a squashy bit between the pedals and the seat,
01:04:46that again, that's that perennial problem, the nut loose behind the wheel,
01:04:50looking here at the AT2 Ferrari, third in the GT2 class for Pierre Kaffer,
01:04:55and the gap, well, about 50 seconds behind the lead battle,
01:04:59which, again, is just about a second apart.
01:05:02On board in Persia, number eight, Stefan Sarazan,
01:05:05again, to use that great TT quote,
01:05:07sucking the rabbits out of the hedgerows at 200 miles an hour,
01:05:10and just making everything else look like, really, it is pedestrian normal road traffic.
01:05:16Yeah, you're absolutely right, Martin.
01:05:17Three minutes, 28.9...
01:05:20You're absolutely right, Martin.
01:05:21Sorry, sorry, I'm sorry.
01:05:2228.9, if you turn off...
01:05:24I don't have to have a swig of drink there,
01:05:26so the mic I've got to get quickly to hear the sucky of the rabbits out of the hedges.
01:05:30Well, I think it's 28.9 now for Stefan Sarazan,
01:05:33just, I think he's just driving really within himself,
01:05:36not, I'm sure he can go faster, he knows he can go faster,
01:05:39and I'm sure he's under strict instructions from the pit lane,
01:05:43just from a nice whatever for you is a consistent pace.
01:05:46Well, actually, possibly slightly more whatever for us is a consistent pace.
01:05:50We're already just about to lap the second best placed Audi.
01:05:55We've got 20 and a half hours to go.
01:05:57We do not need to be doing 25s when 30s patently will preserve the lead we've got.
01:06:03Now, obviously, at Le Mans, there is no lead that is big enough to account for the possibilities.
01:06:08However, you know, you have to be slightly realistic, Simon,
01:06:13and assume that maybe you're not going to get hit by an airstrike by the US Air Force,
01:06:18or, you know, the biggest calamity.
01:06:20If it's a big enough calamity, no lead is going to protect you,
01:06:23so let's just keep it on the island, take fewer chances.
01:06:26Yeah, it was interesting the point that Johnny Molan was making when he joined us earlier,
01:06:29about, you know, the way that the Audi guys seem to work well together.
01:06:33Is there that sense of super competitiveness?
01:06:35And you wonder now, Montani did that tremendous stint, as we see, I think it's Amaral making his way back.
01:06:40Oh, Amaral, yeah.
01:06:41That tremendous stint at the beginning, maybe that was the plan.
01:06:44Let's go out there, let's really go for it.
01:06:46First run, first driver, then let's see.
01:06:49We've got Stefan Sarazen to put in if we need to go crazy fast,
01:06:52but Stefan Sarazen, he's an experienced, intelligent guy.
01:06:55He can do the chill-out full drive, as well as the super-quick stuff, too.
01:06:59Let's just switch gears to LMP2.
01:07:01We've just had both the class-leading cars into the pit lane.
01:07:04There is the number five car of now Keisuke Kunimoto.
01:07:08They've just made the driver change.
01:07:10I was watching it take place right in front of me,
01:07:12and unfortunately for those guys, the number 66 Aston Martin,
01:07:16Thomas Gruber had been off the road into the ground,
01:07:18but he got it back on the track, and he parked it directly in front of the car number five,
01:07:23the LMP2 second-place car.
01:07:25They had to push the Kunimoto backwards in order to pull around to get out of the way.
01:07:30That was not very gentle.
01:07:31Well, we've already seen what his parking skills are like on the Mulsar on the chicane there.
01:07:35So, yeah, he dragged the car back in.
01:07:37Now he's there, softly lit by the sun.
01:07:39See now, if they were a proper racing team, they'd have a table with a white tablecloth
01:07:43and candelabras on it laid for dinner beneath that chandelier,
01:07:46but obviously that's for next year.
01:07:48That's an improvement in the program.
01:07:50I guess you just have to move another way to get the car in.
01:07:52There are some things that are more important than motor racing, dear boy.
01:07:56It takes me back to my child of going to watch F1 in the late 70s and early 80s,
01:08:00and watching Ferrari have their lunch with Pasta, Full Chef, Labrosco, the whole lot,
01:08:05including the drivers I had, and having a glass of wine.
01:08:08Perhaps that's taking its stage too far, but it was the whole,
01:08:11we're Italian, we're going to have a proper lunch.
01:08:13Yeah, I did, but they didn't get a heart battle there,
01:08:15because that was not very gentle with those cars.
01:08:16I mean, literally, Grouwer parked it right in front of the number five...
01:08:21...Porsche?
01:08:23Yeah, Porsche RX Spyder, and to pull that car back,
01:08:27and that was significant, that could be significant,
01:08:28because there was a pretty good battle going on between those LMP2 cars.
01:08:32The car number 31, the Team Essex machine, they did not change drivers,
01:08:36so Casper Elmegaard remained at the wheel, so already they had an advantage there,
01:08:39because more time, of course, spent changing drivers in car number five,
01:08:43because Seiji R had been at the wheel of that car for a long, long time,
01:08:47but that cost them at least another five or six seconds
01:08:49before Kunimoto was able to get out onto the racetrack.
01:08:52Again on board with Stefan Sarrazan, David Brabham is about three minutes behind him,
01:08:57Marco Verna lies third for Audi, Dindo Capello fourth for Audi.
01:09:01We're going to take another quick commercial break,
01:09:03as we continue live from Le Mans on Eurosport to the other side of this word,
01:09:07waiting to hoover up Audi number one in the Peugeot.
01:09:14G'day mate, welcome back to Le Mans with David Brabham,
01:09:17on board Peugeot number nine in second flight, and we'll stop that there.
01:09:21Stefan Sarrazan leads Le Mans, David Brabham in Peugeot number nine in second place.
01:09:25The two team cars on the same lap, and just four cars on the lead lap.
01:09:30Brabham's about three minutes behind Stefan Sarrazan,
01:09:33and that gap opened up between the two Peugeot really in the first hour and a half, I suppose.
01:09:40And since then, okay, now it's time to get down to the plan.
01:09:43We've got our top two positions.
01:09:45That's Miguel Amaral still going very slowly back to the pits in the number 40 car after going off early.
01:09:51And I don't imagine that much will change unless a spanner in the spokes occurs at Peugeot.
01:09:58I don't think that Brabham and his boys will be allowed to try and race the number eight car for the lead,
01:10:05unless something delays them.
01:10:06I wonder also, Martin, if that incident early on,
01:10:09that for those of you that may have missed the early part of the race,
01:10:11there's a calamitous incident involving car seven and the privateer 17 Pescarola car,
01:10:17involving a collision in the pit lane.
01:10:19I wonder if that maybe shook the Peugeot team and going,
01:10:22hang on, guys, we could lose this ourselves.
01:10:24If we don't just stop and think about this,
01:10:26and every little thing has to be taken to the nth degree,
01:10:29pit stops, driver changes, everything.
01:10:31If we just take a step back, we've clearly got the pace.
01:10:34Let's just chill out a little bit and do this right.
01:10:37It's a salient reminder that we are still in hour one, not hour 24,
01:10:41and we are not sprinting to the flag.
01:10:44Amaral's car, it's looking pretty wrecked, Jeremy Shaw.
01:10:47Talking about not sprinting to the flag, that's a great shame.
01:10:51Those guys have worked really hard, and they were...
01:10:54And actually you don't see that many mistakes from Miguel Amaral.
01:10:58He's normally not that prone to binning it,
01:11:00so two in two minutes is unfortunately not a great batting record.
01:11:04It comes back to that point that you made potentially a braking issue
01:11:07or some other issue with the car.
01:11:09It can happen very, very easy, as we know,
01:11:11so that could well have been.
01:11:12With the driver of Amaral's experience,
01:11:13you wouldn't expect that kind of thing to happen.
01:11:15Lots of experience, but nevertheless, very much a gentleman driver.
01:11:19And he's got two professionals there with him, Olivier Pla and Guy Smith.
01:11:23And there's a good view there of the Audi.
01:11:26They're pretty loose, these cars.
01:11:28They don't have, of course, a lot of downforce,
01:11:29particularly on the rear of the cars.
01:11:31And putting the power down coming out of Amaral's nice bit of opposite lock.
01:11:34That one will be the Peugeot, but I take your point.
01:11:36There's been a lot of drivers at Audi.
01:11:38There's been a lot of drivers saying just how twitchy the tail of that Peugeot looks.
01:11:42A lot of the other drivers are saying when they go by you and they go on the brakes,
01:11:45you can see the tail stepping out.
01:11:47A little quick look at the Ginetta Zitek there.
01:11:49Hopefully we're going to get Nigel Moore to come up a little later.
01:11:52Richard Dean.
01:11:53So that will be when Lawrence Tomlinson is in the car.
01:11:56So we better keep it quick because the boss doesn't want to do all the donkey work.
01:12:00But for the fans back home, let's have a little look while we watch Audi and Peugeot.
01:12:03Let's have a little chat about the top British cars in the field,
01:12:07which are the Lola Aston Martins in 7th and 8th place.
01:12:10Thomas Enger in 7th position.
01:12:12Jos Verstappen in 8th place.
01:12:14And I can add to that.
01:12:16I can add. Yeah, go ahead, Jeremy Shaw.
01:12:18Jos Verstappen brought the 008 car into the pits last time around.
01:12:21And now on pit lane right in front of us,
01:12:24sort of cargo off-flight to the right,
01:12:25is the 007 car, Thomas Enger, that was at the wheel.
01:12:29I think he remains so, doesn't he?
01:12:31I think he may.
01:12:32In fact, that's 009.
01:12:33That is the delayed third car.
01:12:35Yes, lots of headlamp flashing.
01:12:38That's very much a feature here.
01:12:39I'm sure one of the things designers are asked by the drivers is,
01:12:42can you give me brighter headlights?
01:12:44Like, could you make them melt the car in front?
01:12:46Reg, have you got any ray guns, you know, laser beams, that sort of thing?
01:12:49Well, I think since anybody that's got Zenon headlights on their road car
01:12:52will know the benefit you've got of that.
01:12:54There's a great shot there of what Le Mans is all about.
01:12:56Ginetta is a manufacturer providing lots of different forms of motorsport,
01:13:00from Ginetta Junior to G20s, G50s, and now the Zytec programme.
01:13:04And their staircase of talent has produced this wonderful young driver,
01:13:07Nigel Moore, 17 years old.
01:13:0917 years old, you're going down the Mulsanne Strait in a prototype,
01:13:12and you look in your mirror and there's an Audi coming past you,
01:13:15and last year you were racing at Mallory Park and the like.
01:13:19And that shows you what this race can do for a young driver's career.
01:13:22It is still the one blue-ribboned event that an amateur driver can do.
01:13:27You can't race the Monaco Grand Prix, you can't race the Indy 500,
01:13:31you can still race at Le Mans as an amateur.
01:13:34Not as an impecunious amateur, you do need to have a bit of backing behind you.
01:13:38But you can get in in your first drive at Le Mans
01:13:41and be in amongst the world's greatest sports car drivers in a race that everybody knows.
01:13:46And it is the great thrill of Le Mans for many drivers.
01:13:49It is just to be able to come here and race this fantastic event.
01:13:52And it's interesting, I've been walking around the site today
01:13:55just looking at all the fans that are here.
01:13:57The amount of Ginetta flags, people have really taken them to their heart.
01:14:00The British fans love them on and they love a British underdog.
01:14:03I'm guessing the factory at Sheffield isn't busy today.
01:14:05Here's Joao Barbosa.
01:14:06Everything is going well.
01:14:08Everything is going according to plan so far.
01:14:11You know, it's still very early in the race but so far no mistakes and no problems at all.
01:14:16So everything looks good.
01:14:18With the diesel cars in the front and the Aston Martins and you and the Oricas behind,
01:14:23what do you aim for here in this 24 hours?
01:14:25You know, it's very difficult to predict but we definitely aim for a top 10 car
01:14:29you know, I think we can still go for the overall and the petrols.
01:14:34The Aston Martins are surprising really fast and you know, but we have a good pace
01:14:39and we have our own rhythm and we're going to worry with a faster pace later tomorrow.
01:14:44How difficult is it for you that you have now two different cars in your team?
01:14:48That you don't run two similar cars so you cannot exchange setup details?
01:14:53Well, actually, you know, the Pascarolo Sport has been doing an amazing job with both cars.
01:14:59They've been very reliable and really fast.
01:15:02So, and it's different cruise for each car so it's not actually a big problem for us.
01:15:06We have different engineers, different mechanics for each car so it's not a problem.
01:15:10Okay, thank you very much.
01:15:11Thanks.
01:15:12And of course they managed not to hit any of their Peugeot teammates.
01:15:16Speaking of which, Peugeot still first and second.
01:15:18Sarazan ahead of Bradman, Miguel Amaral brings most of his wagon back in
01:15:21and that is going to cost them, Jeremy, probably the better part of an hour
01:15:25to rebuild that front corner and send him out.
01:15:27So, now it's just a race of survival isn't it?
01:15:29Now the only thing they've got to do is finish.
01:15:33Oh dear.
01:15:34They've already lost a lot of time with that car.
01:15:36They've been off the road several times, had a couple of delays
01:15:38and that's really, well, I hesitate to say the end of any hope of a good finish
01:15:44but pretty much the end of a hope of any good finish.
01:15:47I wonder whether the team are in a position where they've already built a corner up
01:15:51so they've got the whole thing assembled.
01:15:53Well, they have had 20 minutes.
01:15:54Yes.
01:15:55What I'm meaning is that sometimes before the race,
01:15:57we also remember that the early days of the R8,
01:15:59the thing that the R8 was so impressive,
01:16:01they could just drop the whole back end off the car,
01:16:03you know, gearbox, suspension, a lot, bang,
01:16:05changed a lot in about 10 minutes and I think it's less than that in fact.
01:16:08And this is possibly a case where,
01:16:11we were talking earlier about how everybody's really learnt from each other
01:16:14and the different techniques for this new pit stop ball
01:16:16where only two guys are working out there.
01:16:18They're very chilled out bunch of mechanics.
01:16:20You see, they've still got all the others,
01:16:22only two of these are going to do any work for the rest of the weekend.
01:16:24Everybody else is catching a few sets.
01:16:26And actually guys, seriously, that's because it's about 30 degrees down there
01:16:30and it's pretty stifling.
01:16:31There's a lot of moisture in the air.
01:16:33We are expecting rain tomorrow,
01:16:35but the heat here is not unusual at the moment,
01:16:37but it really saps you.
01:16:39The heat coming out of that concrete in the pit lane
01:16:42really takes it out of the cruise.
01:16:44Yeah, and I will say anybody that's ever worn a race suit for any length of time
01:16:47will know that how it just completely incubates the heat into your body
01:16:51and that it really is a very, very difficult thing.
01:16:53You see most drivers, as soon as they're in a race suit around your waist,
01:16:56you know, cold boards.
01:16:57We used to see the Group C days.
01:16:59You'd see buckets of ice on the floor.
01:17:01Drivers sitting there looking like being literally wrung out.
01:17:04Now, meanwhile, back with the action, you can see on track, of course,
01:17:08is the one car last year's champions.
01:17:10The guys that won the race last year,
01:17:12this combination of drivers, Capello, Christensen,
01:17:14and, of course, our own Alan McNish.
01:17:17Interesting to see the pace of the two drivers have driven so far in the number one car,
01:17:22which is McNish and Capello.
01:17:23It's been very similar.
01:17:24It's been very similar.
01:17:25But I think at the moment it seems like pace generally has dropped off.
01:17:28You know, say possibly that Sarrazan was going to be able to go 25s or 24 when he got into the car.
01:17:35But everybody seems to be generally a little bit steadier at the very front at the moment.
01:17:39Yeah, I think you're right.
01:17:40Except there goes, as you say that, David Bradham comes across the line in a 3 minutes 28.3.
01:17:45That's pretty respectful.
01:17:46That's one of the quickest laps we've seen recently.
01:17:49It just, as we were talking there,
01:17:53the 007 Lola Aston Martin Thomas Enger came in for a very quick pitch,
01:17:58so fuel only on that car.
01:18:00They've been having, he's been having a fabulous battle with his teammates,
01:18:03Jos Verstappen, who was in a couple of laps ago.
01:18:06I thought, as you said earlier on, Martin Haven,
01:18:09I thought it was a 007 car down in front.
01:18:11It was a 009, but the 007 has just been in.
01:18:14And they're on a strategy that is a couple of laps apart
01:18:18in terms of their pit stop.
01:18:19Here is the second place overall car onto the pit lane.
01:18:22When did Bradham last stop?
01:18:24He stopped last on lap 50.
01:18:26Okay, it's now lap 62.
01:18:28So that's another 12 lapper.
01:18:29Perfect for him.
01:18:30So yes, no problems at all.
01:18:31He stays in.
01:18:32Drinks bottle obviously not full.
01:18:33That little addition of having something to drink really makes a difference.
01:18:39It helps cool the mouth down,
01:18:40and that does really strange things to your head.
01:18:43It makes you think you're not quite as hot as you are.
01:18:45It's amazing what a tiny little sip of liquid can do.
01:18:48A lot of them are under pressure, aren't they?
01:18:49With a little valve inside the helmet,
01:18:52you just bite the valve with your teeth
01:18:54just to deliver a little mouthful.
01:18:56And of course, in years gone by,
01:18:57they used to have motorized ones that occasionally would must function
01:19:00and just try and drown the driver
01:19:02when they wouldn't go off on the steering wheel button.
01:19:04So most of them try and use a little pressurized system
01:19:06that the driver bites to get the drink in.
01:19:10In comes eight, our race leader.
01:19:12Yes.
01:19:13That's absolutely on schedule here.
01:19:15Lap 63.
01:19:16So it was actually maybe slightly earlier than before.
01:19:19That car had done 13 laps on each of its previous stints.
01:19:23This time, it's only 12 laps.
01:19:25But again, a perfect pit stop by kind of a nine a couple of seconds ago.
01:19:30Just fuel only.
01:19:31Looks like they're doing the same again for the race leader side.
01:19:34Yeah, it does look like they've got everything under control in terms of that.
01:19:38They were saying earlier that we've talked about this incident
01:19:41where the Pescarolo, Peugeot and the number seven car collided.
01:19:45The plan originally was to never to have two cars in at once.
01:19:48That hadn't happened in that stop earlier on.
01:19:50And you can see by the perfect timing of the Grab'em going out,
01:19:54Sarazen coming in, that they seem to have got themselves.
01:19:57Coming back to that point we made earlier,
01:19:59they seem to have learned from that big shake-up they had with the seven car,
01:20:02let's not do that with the rest of our cars.
01:20:04I thought one of the key things that Henri Pescarello talked about
01:20:06was the fact that it was always the plan not ever to have
01:20:10any of the four Peugeot, his included, on the pit road at the same time.
01:20:14And he said Peugeot changed their mind.
01:20:16So his car was coming in, there were already two Peugeot in there,
01:20:20which was a mistake.
01:20:21And then waving the car out in front of his car was obviously an added mistake.
01:20:25But already that die had partially been cast by somebody in the Peugeot camp
01:20:29deciding actually we're not sure we can go that extra lap with one of those cars.
01:20:34We've got to go in.
01:20:35GT2 leader is on pit road.
01:20:37Jörg Bergmeister gets out.
01:20:39Well, see nobody's actually helping him.
01:20:41He's about seven foot twelve and really does need a bit of help to get out of a Porsche door
01:20:46because at waist height, in fact at driver's rib height,
01:20:49is a bar that goes across to stop other things coming in.
01:20:52Cars, barriers, that sort of thing.
01:20:54And you have to get out basically, if you think of the Dukes of Hazzard,
01:20:57you're getting out of a shape the size of the window.
01:21:00So it's not exactly easy stuff.
01:21:02And that looked to me like it was a team owner, Seth Nyman, getting into the number 80 car,
01:21:07a good bit shorter than Jörg Bergmeister.
01:21:08This is going to be, for that team, a very crucial stint
01:21:11because Seth is very much a gentleman driver.
01:21:14He owns the team, that's why he's driving the car.
01:21:17And he's now, there's a lot of pressure on Seth now because he doesn't want to throw that car off the road.
01:21:22He is leading the class and he has to be pretty careful.
01:21:25009 back in the garage.
01:21:27It's his second unscheduled pit stop for the 009 Lola Aston Martin.
01:21:30Well, if all the bad luck is hovering over that car like an Albatross,
01:21:34it's going to be tough for Stuart Hall, Peter Cox and Harold Premat,
01:21:37but it might be better for the others.
01:21:39We're just about to leave you here on Eurosport 2.
01:21:42We will continue over on Eurosport International.
01:21:45Pierre Caffer, second in the GT2 cars.
01:21:48It's also on pit road as the Lola Aston Martin and Aston Martin Racing Boys
01:21:53battle to try and sort out what ails that 009 car.
01:21:58Stephen Sarrazan leads from David Brabham here at Le Mans.
01:22:01Coverage continues live back on the big dog.
01:22:04We're on Eurosport after this break.
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