Kobayashi Puts Toyota Fastest in Eventful 24H Le Mans FP2

Toyota endured an eventful second practice session for the 24 Hours of Le Mans but ended up topping the timesheets thanks to Kamui Kobayashi as the field experienced the circuit at night for the first time.

Nyck de Vries spun the No. 7 Toyota TR010 Hybrid early in the session after clouting the curbs at the Dunlop Chicane, which required repairs to the underside of the car.

But the crew bounced back from that strife in the closing minutes as Kobayashi posted a 3:26.096 to set the ultimate pace.

The AF Corse Ferrari that failed to progress into Hyperpole earlier on Wednesday had been on course to top FP2 prior to Kobayashi’s late improvement.

Yifei Ye bounced back from the qualifying disappointment earlier in the day to clock a 3:26.316 at the wheel of the No. 83 Ferrari 499P that won last year’s race to finish up two tenths adrift of the Toyota.

Ye was just 0.071 seconds faster than the No. 101 Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac V-Series.R of Filipe Albuquerque, who suffered a momentary engine cut out when the car entered the pits midway through the session, while Victor Martins posted a 3:26.417 to go fourth quickest at the wheel of the No. 36 Alpine A424.

Fifth fastest was the No. 12 Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA entry of Will Stevens on a 3:26.420 but this was another car in the wars as it suffered a punctured front-right tire with Louis Deletraz at the wheel late in the session.

Genesis Magma Racing’s impressive Le Mans debut continued as, after getting both cars into Hyperpole 1 earlier, Mathieu Jaminet put the No. 19 Genesis GMR-001 sixth on the FP2 leaderboard with a 3:26.852.

Seventh fastest was the other Toyota thanks to a 3:26.912 from Ryo Hirakawa, during an eventful session for the Japanese manufacturer.

Brendon Hartley had earlier spun the No. 8 car at the second Mulsanne chicane, while Hirakawa was another driver to suffer a slow puncture.

Eighth fastest was the best of the Heart of Racing Aston Martin Valkyries, the No. 007 machine of Ross Gunn clocking a 3:26.935.

The two WRT-run BMW M Hybrid V8s rounded out the top-ten with Sheldon van der Linde fractionally quicker of the two after posting a 3:27.003 in the No. 20 car.

There was an early end to the session for the No. 15 entry after Dries Vanthoor was beached in the Esses in the closing minutes.

There was more misery for Peugeot as it was the only manufacturer not represented inside the top-ten, having earlier failed to make the Hyperpole cut, and the pair of 9X8s brought up the rear of the Hypercar field in FP2.

Forestier Racing leads LMP2, WRT BMW Tops LMGT3 

There was no disputing who was the star of FP2 in the LMP2 division as Esteban Masson clocked a 3:33.645 at the wheel of the No. 29 Forestier Racing by Panis Oreca 07 Gibson to head the leaderboard by over a second.

Second fastest in class was the No. 4 CrowdStrike by APR machine of Alex Quinn with a 3:34.965 while third fastest was Kuba Smiechowski at the wheel of the No. 43 Inter Europol Competition Oreca that triumphed last year having set a 3:36.111.

Fourth in class was the No. 9 Proton Competition entry of Kakunoshin Ohta with a 3:36.272 while the top-five was completed by Job van Uitert in the No. 28 IDEC Sport machine.

It was BMW that led the way in the LMGT3 ranks courtesy of a 3:55.132 set by Augusto Farfus early in the session at the wheel of the WRT-run BMW M4 GT3 EVO.

Farfus finished up three tenths faster than Maxime Martin at the wheel of the No. 61 Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo, who posted a 3:55.488.

The next trio of cars were all within a tenth of Martin’s time with Riccardo Pera ending up third in the No. 92 Manthey Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo.

Fourth was Marvin Kirchhoefer in the No. 10 Garage 59 McLaren 720S GT3 Evo that won last time out at Spa, while the top-five was completed by Alessio Rovera in the No. 21 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3 Evo.

The next on-track action will be the three-hour third practice session that is due to begin at 2:45 p.m. CEST on Thursday (10:45 a.m. EST).

RESULTS: Free Practice 2