Dumas: “We will remember this story”

La Porsche n°2 won a surprising victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans by taking the lead of the race on the very last lap following mechanical problems encountered by the Toyota n°5 of Nakajima-Buemi-Davidson who doesn't even finish ranked.

This 18th victory for Porsche thus has a particular flavor, particularly for Neel Jani who won for the first time in Sarthe for the eighth participation, while he was at the wheel when finishing the event.

“I received the radio message to the team telling me that the Toyota was idling and that we had to attack to try to catch up. I couldn't believe it when I saw it stopped on the straight during the last lap. This kind of thing almost never happens in one's life.", commented the Swiss at a press conference.

His teammate Romain Dumas celebrates his second victory in Sarthe after that of 2010 won with Audi. “The regulations were changed this year to slow down the cars. As a competitor, the main thing is to be as fast as possible. It's hard to realize what's happening. We are all very sorry for Toyota. We will remember this story », added the Alésien who will go to Pikes Peak next week to try to win a new edition of the American climb.

“We couldn't do 14 lap stints, only 13, and this race very quickly became complicated for us because we constantly had to be on the attack. It’s a magnificent success even if we would have preferred to win this race differently”, admitted Marc Lieb who also won his first success in the general classification of the Sarthe double clock tour.

Discover the analysis of the 84th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans carried out by our special correspondents in issue 2068 of AUTOhebdo, available from Monday evening in digital version on all platforms, and from Wednesday on newsstands.