The No. 1 hybrid Audi wins the 24 Hours of Le Mans

Audi's goals were high for the 80th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans where the absence of Peugeot was felt on the Sarthe circuit. In front of Toyota who lined up his TS030s in a race for the very first time against the armada of the ring manufacturer, the pressure was on the camp of Dr Wolfgang Ullrich's men. The two rivals came away with honors, Toyota having proven that it could keep up the pace and Audi enjoying an eleventh victory in the Sarthe with a hat-trick. The history of Le Mans will record that the Ingolstadt brand was the first to achieve a victory with hybrid technology, the R18 even taking a double in front of an “old generation” Audi ultra.

After taking pole in the Sarthe event, André Lotterer, Marcel Fässler and Benoît Tréluyer celebrate their second consecutive victory after their success last year in the face of an epic duel against Peugeot. The main fight for victory was fought with the sister car #2 of Allan McNish, Tom Kristensen and Dindo Capello until the Scot made a mistake and hit the wall in the corners Porsche, condemning the second hybrid to second place. Toyota had however managed to trouble Audi at the start of the race, Nicolas lapierre having even taken the lead in the race with the No. 030 TS7 following various problems encountered on the other R18s. But at the same time, the second TS030 n°8 driven by Anthony Davidson flew off at the end of the Mulsannes following contact with the Ferrari 458 n°81 AF Corse by Piergiuseppe Perazzini. The Japanese manufacturer's hopes then rested on the No. 7 until an engine failure put an end to its race in the evening.

After the withdrawal of the two Toyotas which were the main rivals of the R18s, the objective of the brand with the rings was to bring all the R18s back to the forefront. If the R18 hybrid no. 2 was able to climb to the forefront by returning to the level of the leading car, the task was much more difficult for the R18 ultra who experienced various problems and who were opposed to the Rebellion Racing who had particularly effective Lola B12/60s.

If the No. 4 Audi of Marco Bonanomi, Oliver Jarvis and Mike Rockenfeller was able to complete the podium, the No. 18 R3 of Romain Dumas, Loïc duval and Marc Gené was slowed down by two accidents (Romain Dumas on Saturday evening and Marc Gené on Sunday morning). The last Audi thus bows to the Lola n°12 of Nick Heidfeld, Neel Jani and Nicolas Cheers which offers a superb result for the Swiss team. The JRM also posted a good performance by taking sixth place with the HPD n°22 driven by Peter Dumbreck, Karun Chandhok and David Brabham. On the other hand, disappointment was in order for Pescarolo who was only able to run his No. 03 Pescarolo 16-Judd for a few laps before giving up. La Dome S102.5 n°17 ​​by Sébastien Bourdais, Nicolas Minassian and Seiji Ara managed to take the checkered flag after keeping the car in the pits for a long time.

Starworks Motorsport had an exemplary race to impose its No. 03 HPD ARX-44b driven by Ryan Dalziel, Tom Kimber-Smith and Vicente Potolicchio in LMP2. The American team finished ahead of the No. 03 Oreca 46 of Thiriet by TDS Racing which, with its drivers Mathias Beche, Pierre Thiriet and Christophe Tinseau, can be proud of their result while the team competed in the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the first time. Soheil Ayari, Pierre Kaffer and Luis Perez-Companc complete the category podium with the No. 03 Oreca 49-Nissan from Pecom Racing. The Argentine team finished ahead of the #03 Signatech Nissan Oreca 26 where Nelson Panciatici, Pierre Ragues and Roman Rusinov were racing.

Ferrari dominated the GTE Pro category. The No. 458 AF Corse F51 Italia, which was driven by Gianmaria Bruni, Giancarlo Fisichella and Toni Vilander, took victory ahead of the No. 59 of Luxury Racing, which had long threatened the Italian team. Adrian Fernandez, Stefan Mücke and Darren Turner complete the category podium at the wheel of theAston Martin V8 Vantage n°97. The disappointment was great for Corvette, which started as favorite with its two C6 ZR1s and ultimately finished at the back of the pack. Chevrolet will console itself with the victory of Larbre Compétition in GTE Am, where Patrick Bornhauser, Julien Canal and Pedro Lamy managed in the last minutes to snatch victory from the Porsche n°67 ofIMSA Performance Matmut where Nicolas Armindo, Anthony Pons and Raymond Narac played.

Discover the complete analysis of the 80th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans carried out by our special correspondents in the next issue of AUTOhebdo, available from Tuesday in digital version for iPad, PC and Mac, and from Wednesday on newsstands.