Toyota Ends Up Fastest in Night Practice

Toyota ended up fastest in Wednesday night’s second Free Practice session for the 24 Hours of Le Mans as Robert Kubica had his lap times scrubbed for pit lane speeding.

Ex-Formula 1 racer Kubica had set the quickest time at the very start of the the two-hour session aboard the No. 83 AF Corse Ferrari 499P, a 3:25.101, to go just a little over a second clear of the second-placed No. 8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid of Sebastien Buemi.

However, in the closing stages of the session, Kubica was stripped of his times, which demoted the No. 83 down to third position with a best lap of 3:26.680 from Yifei Ye, fractionally behind the No. 12 Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA machine of Norman Nato.

A last-minute improvement by Pascal Wehrlein in the No. 4 Penske Porsche 963 put him fourth ahead of Miguel Molina in the best of the factory Ferraris, the No. 50, and another late improver, Raffaele Marciello in the No. 15 BMW M Hybrid V8.

There was an incident on the approach to the Ford chicane as the checkered flag came out, involving the No. 8 Toyota of Ryo Hirakawa and the Kessel Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 of Casper Stevenson. Hirakawa was subsequently summoned by the stewards.

In LMP2, Dane Cameron set the pace aboard the No. 199 AO by TF Oreca 07 Gibson with a best lap of 3:37.515.

Second-fastest was Pietro Fittipaldi aboard the No. 22 United Autosports Oreca, followed by Tom Blomqvist in the No. 37 CLX – Pure Rxcing car.

The Akkodis ASP team locked out the top two positions in the LMGT3 class with its pair of Lexus RC F GT3s.

Quicker of the two was the No. 87 car of Jose Maria Lopez on a 3:55.422, which narrowly eclipsed the 3:55.449 set by Jack Hawksworth in the No. 78 car.

Best of the rest was the No. 91 Manthey Porsche 911 GT3 R in which Richard Lietz set the best time, some 0.564 seconds off the pace.

As well as the No. 63 Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo, still damaged from Stephen Grove’s earlier crash, the No. 33 TF Sport Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R also did not turn any laps owing to a gearbox change due to a seal leak.

The session was interrupted by a full-course yellow and a subsequent red flag when one of the Aston Martin Valkyries blew a tire, leaving debris on the track.

Practice for the 24H Le Mans continues with Free Practice 3 on Thursday at 2:45 p.m. local time (8:45 a.m. EDT).

RESULTS: Free Practice 2