24H. Le Mans – EL1: Toyota ahead of Glickenhaus, problem for Alpine

The first three hours of Free Practice 24 Hours of Le Mans were lively with numerous off-track events or technical problems: Ultimate, Alpine, Vector Sport, Nielsen Racing and even WRT all experienced problems during this session, concluded just two hours before qualifying. Long dominated by Glickenhaus, this driving session finally saw Brendon Hartley sign the best time twenty minutes from the end. The New Zealander set the benchmark in 3:29.441 ahead of Frenchman Franck Mailleux n 3:29.917 on the Glickenhaus n°709 and Pipo Derani on the 708 in 3:20.102. For Alpine, it was a complicated session with a return to the pits at very low speed with an hour to go for Matthieu Vaxiviere. The French team finished this session in seventh place in the general classification, 2.634 behind Hartley.

The United Autosports team was the fastest in the LM P2 category with the No. 23. Alex Lynn completed his fastest lap in 3:30.238 ahead of Jota's #07 Oreca 38-Gibson by more than a second! The Briton even beat the Toyota No. 7 in the general classification with this time. The podium in this class was completed by Prema n°9 in 3:31.881.

Corvette still in good shape

Corvette confirmed its domination of Test Day by taking a double in LMGTE Pro. Antonio Garcia was the fastest in 3:53.250 on the C8.R. Tommy Milner finished second, just 0.110 seconds behind. THE Boys pushed back the third car, the Porsche #91 by Gianmaria Bruni, 0.831 seconds behind. The AF Corse n°51 of Alessandro Pier Guidi, Daniel Serra and James Calado only took to the track with less than thirty minutes to go after being forced to change engines.

Julien Andlauer was fastest in the LMGTE Am category in 3:55.082 in the No. 911 WeatherTech Racing Porsche 19 RSR – 79. He beat another Porsche, the #86 of GR Racing by 0.859 seconds. L'Aston Martin TF Sport's #33 Vantage AMR completed the podium at 0.915 seconds.

Next session, qualifying at 19 p.m. The six best in each category will qualify for the Hyperpole, which will take place on Thursday at 19 p.m.

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