AUTOhebdo: The Audi - Toyota duel

The defection of Peugeot did nothing. Le Mans will always remain Le Mans. From the flight of Anthony Davidson's Toyota to too many errors from Audi, this 80th edition was full of twists and turns. And it rewards a hybrid car for the first time.

Published on 19/06/2012 à 17:36

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Saturday June 16, 19:01 p.m. It's been almost an hour and a half since an unprecedented phenomenon occurred on the Le Mans circuit. The leading Audi n°1 seems to suffer from a drop in voltage, while conversely, both Toyota TS030 line up, lap after lap, great times. The gap acquired dearly by Audi at the start of the race (up to more than a minute) evaporates dangerously at the start of the fourth hour of the race.

The junction between the Japanese n°7 and the German n°1 finally takes place in the Mulsanne straight. The Toyota harasses the Audi, annoys it, then attacks thanks to its better top speed. Benoît Tréluyer, at the wheel of the R18 e-tron quattro, does not give up and takes up the challenge of Nicolas lapierre. One of the most beautiful battles in the history ofEndurance just got involved...

Discover the rest of this report in the new issue of AUTOhebdo, with a file of 42 exceptional pages on 24 Hours of Le Mans produced by our special correspondents. The new AUTOhebdo is now available here in digital version for iPad, PC and Mac, and on newsstands tomorrow.