Le Mans Thursday Notebook

***The lap time with which Alex Lynn scored pole in this year’s 24 Hours of Le Mans, a 3:23.166, was not the quickest lap of Thursday night’s Hyperpole. That was set in the opening segment by Jack Aitken, who topped Hyperpole 1 with a 3:22.742, surpassing the previous record of 3:22.982 set by Antonio Fuoco in 2023.

***Cadillac becomes the first American manufacturer to secure pole for the French endurance classic since 1967, when Bruce McLaren secured top spot at the wheel of a Ford GT40 Mk IV. Lynn meanwhile becomes the first British poleman at Le Mans since Johnny Herbert in 2004.

***Lynn said: “I’m truly honored to be able to put in a performance like that in front everyone and deliver the car to Cadillac how they deserve — in first position. It’s a special feeling. I can’t describe it. It’s such a magical circuit, a wonderful place and a place where I really try to perform my best. We’ll enjoy this tonight, have a good sleep and reset.”

***It marks Hertz Team JOTA’s first FIA World Endurance Championship pole of the Hypercar era, and only Cadillac’s second following Lynn’s pole at Fuji last season. Cadillac becomes the fifth manufacturer to lock out the front row at Le Mans after Audi, Porsche, Toyota and Ferrari.

***Porsche LMDh factory director Urs Kuratle was magnanimous in defeat as the two Penske-run 963s that made it to Hyperpole 2 ended up third and fifth. “We can definitely live with that,” said Kuratle. “It’s not what we were hoping for. The times are really fast, Cadillac did a great job and we have  to accept this. We are happy, definitely.”

***Kuratle suggested that the incident involving the No. 5 Porsche in the first part of qualifying, when Julien Andlauer shed his right-rear wheel on his way into the pits, could be put down to ‘finger trouble’. “It’s not a [wheel] gun issue,” he clarified. “We put another wheel on and we left [the pits].”

***Porsche has not divulged further details following the disqualification of its No. 6 car from Wednesday’s qualifying, which will see last year’s pole-winning car start from the rear of the Hypercar field. Kuratle did not disclose the margin by which the car was underweight when asked by reporters after Hyperpole.

***Kuratle did however concede that Porsche missed the No. 6 car, which would have had Kevin Estre at the wheel had it made it as far as Hyperpole 2. “With Kevin in the car, it would have been a great qualifying for the No. 6 car definitely,” he said. “We missed him big-time. Looking at the results, we are sure he would have been in the mix as well.”

***BMW M Motorsport director Andreas Roos expressed satisfaction with the Bavarian marque’s performance in both categories it participates in, as Dries Vanthoor secured fourth on the grid in Hypercar and Valentino Rossi qualified third in LMGT3.

***Roos told Sportscar365: “If you would have told me before the weekend we would have both cars in Hyperpole 2, and we would be P4 and P6, I would have immediately taken it. In a field of 21 Hypercars, I think we can be super happy.”

***On why BMW opted for the unorthodox strategy of using Platinum-rated Kelvin van der Linde in Hyperpole 1 and Silver-rated Rossi in Hyperpole 2, Roos replied: “We were not sure if we would make it into Hyperpole 2, and we wanted to make sure we had the pace. Vale did a fantastic job. The gap to P1 is significant, even huge, but he did a fantastic job to put the car P3.”

***Ferrari did not initially plan for Miguel Molina to participate in Hyperpole 1, but was forced into a change of plan when Nicklas Nielsen was taken ill. Antonio Fuoco went on to qualify the No. 50 car seventh in Hyperpole 2.

***First-time WEC polesitter Mattia Drudi indicated that an improved final sector on his second lap helped him gain the edge over Vista AF Corse driver Alessio Rovera in Hyperpole, where the Italian secured his first WEC pole.

***Drudi told Sportscar365: “A super-clean lap. Already on the first one I think the performance was really good. I messed up a bit in the last sector, I have to say. That’s where I made the difference. It’s where I improved on my lap compared to the previous one. There was a bit of a drop in the tires. I didn’t expect to be that quick.”

***Aston Martin becomes only the third LMGT3 manufacturer to score multiple pole positions since the inception of the category last year, following McLaren and Lamborghini. It also becomes the first marque to capture multiple poles in three different classes: GTE-Pro, GTE-Am and LMGT3.

***LMP2 pacesetter Mathias Beche scored his first WEC pole in his 52nd attempt. TDS Racing meanwhile ended a drought of almost six years since its previous WEC pole at Silverstone in 2019, when it ran the Racing Team Nederland effort. That year, it took LMP2 pole at Le Mans under its own banner with Loic Duval driving.

***Wayne Taylor Racing carried out a change of engine on its No. 101 Cadillac V-Series.R after “detecting a potential issue” during Free Practice 3. Wayne Taylor himself told Radio Le Mans that the team had already installed its race engine the previous day, meaning the unit installed on Thursday was a back-up.

***Antonello Coletta, Ferrari’s global head of endurance, suggested that Ferrari will seek to retain all six of its factory Hypercar drivers speaking to media at Le Mans this week. Nicklas Nielsen, Alessandro Pier Guidi and James Calado were all given multi-year extensions ahead of the 2024 season, while Ferrari announced its agreements Antonio Fuoco and Miguel Molina were renewed last October.

***Coletta said: “There are drivers who have multi-year contracts, and others whose contracts we are renewing [this year], so after Le Mans, when we have agreements to renew, we sit down at the table and together we look for the best solution for everyone. I can only reiterate that at the moment there is no intention of changing anyone, so I hope that we can remain with the same crews also in the upcoming seasons.”

***Kevin Groot is no longer with Ford Performance, with former Ford Performance motorsports program supervisor for GT3 and GT4 Alex Allmandinger having taken Groot’s role as global sports car racing manager. The change is understood to have been made last month.

***American Thunder: NASCAR to Le Mans premiers today on Prime Video, capturing the NASCAR Next Gen Garage 56 effort at Le Mans in 2023. Drivers Jimmie Johnson, Mike Rockenfeller and Jenson Button shared the No. 24 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1, a Hendrick Motorsports-prepared effort that brought NASCAR Chairman and CEO Jim France’s vision to compete at Le Mans to life. The car is on-site at the Village Tribunes this weekend.

***FIA’s Women in Motorsport Commission held its annual networking event on Thursday morning at Le Mans. Susanna Coletta, the daughter of Ferrari’s global head of endurance Antonello, who serves as Project Coordinator for the Commission, helped organize the event, which was attended by ACO President Pierre Fillon and FIA Endurance Commission President Richard Mille.

***Friday is free of on-track action, as teams and drivers recuperate ahead of the start of Saturday’s race, but the ACO’s annual press conference is set for 11 a.m. local time (EST). Additionally, future Hypercar entrants McLaren, Genesis and Ford have announcements planned concerning their respective programs for the afternoon.

John Dagys and Davey Euwema contributed to this report