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Audi is now just three Le Mans victories away from tying Porsche in the record books at Circuit de la Sarthe.
For the 13th time in the last 15 years, Audi claimed overall victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. It was a one-two finish for the R18 e-tron racers, with Benoit Treluyer, Marcel Fassler and Andre Lotterer’s No.2 car leading the sister No. 1 ride of Tom Kristensen, Lucas di Grassi and Marc Gene.
The race’s early going was marred by rain, chaos, and shunts—most notably an incident involving the No. 8 Toyota TS040 of Nicolas Lapierre, which spun, collecting both Marco Bonanomi’s No. 3 Audi R18 and Sam Bird’s No. 81 AF Corse Ferrari 458.
Lapierre made it back to the pits; Bird and Bonanomi did not.
As Le Mans continued past the halfway mark, it was the Toyota hybrids putting down laps in the 3:25 and 3:22 range—roughly 2 seconds quicker than the rival Audis—and dominating the race. Just before sunrise, though, catastrophe struck when overall leader Kazuki Nakajima’s No. 7 Toyota slowed near Arnage and subsequently retired due to electrical failure.
RELATED: Electrical gremlins end Le Mans for race-leading Toyota TS040 hybrid
With 10 hours remaining, the No. 2 Audi took command, ahead of the second-place No. 20 Porsche 919 Hybrid and No. 1 Audi R18 in third.
More drama arose during the race’s closing stanza when Tom Kristensen’s No. 1 Audi—which had taken the lead after its sister car was forced to pit with turbocharged problems—slowed with forced induction issues of its own during Hour 21.
The No. 20 Porsche moved to the front, but ground to a halt at Mulsanne when Mark Webber suffered a (still unidentified) mechanical problem, relinquishing the top spot back to Audi with an excruciating two hours remaining at Sarthe.
Audi’s No. 2 car then led its No. 1 twin, with the third-place No. 8 Toyota TS040 in tow, as they finished.
The No. 51 AF Corse Ferrari 458 of Giancarlo Fisichella, Gianmaria Bruni and Toni Vilander finished two laps ahead of the No. 73 Corvette Racing C7.R driven by Antonio Garcia, Jordan Taylor, and Jan Magnussen to win GTE-Pro. It was a good showing for Corvette Racing in the C7.R’s Le Mans debut, however. The team endured a broken air jack and subsequent fiasco to finish ahead of the 3rd-place No. 92 Manthey Porsche piloted by Frédéric Makoweicki, Richard Lietz, and Marco Holzer.
Jota Sport’s No. 38 Zytek-Nissan Z11SN won a close battle in LMP2, thanks to deft driving from Harry Tincknell, Simon Dolan, and Oliver Turvey.
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Finally, a great story transpired in GTE-Am, where the No. 95 Aston Martin Vantage with its all-Danish driver lineup of Kristian Poulsen, Nicki Thim, and David Heinemeier-Hansson took the class victory. The team raced in memory of fellow Dane Allan Simonsen, who tragically died during last year’s race.
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