Neal Jani puts Porsche on Le Mans 24hrs pole with record breaking time

By: Rahul Kapoor

Jun 12 2015

While the forecast showed that rain was approaching the city of Le Mans, no sign of any drizzle was seen as the three Porsche 919 Hybrids qualified on the top three spots of the grid for 83^rd edition of the Le Mans 24 Hours as Jani/Lieb/Dumas qualified on pole.

Neil Jani set the pace with a qualifying record breaking lap of the track with a blistering time of 3m 16.887s which was unbeaten thought all sessions of qualifying. The two sister Porsche 919 Hybrids of Webber/Hartley/Bernhard and Hulkenberg/Tandy/Bamber qualified in 2^nd and 3^rd respectively to lock out the entire front of the grid for the race.

The other Germans from Audi Sport Team Joest couldn’t quite match the qualifying pace of the Porsches and had to settle for 4^th 5^th and 6^th right behind the Porsches with Duval/di Grassi/Jarvis leading the team in front of Lotterer/Fassler/Treluyer in 5^th and Albuquerque/Bonanomi/Rast in 6th.

Three Porsche 919 Hybrids qualified on the top three spots

The Audi’s are followed by the two Japanese Toyotas of Wurz/Conway/Sarrazin and Wurz/Conway/Sarrazin in 7^th and 8^th respectively. The radically designed and developed Nissan GT-R LM Nismo cars struggled to keep up with the other Hybrid competition as Tincknell/Krumm/Buncombe could only manage the fastest lap time of 3m 36.995s which is 20.1 seconds off the pace set by Jani in the Porsche 918 Hybrid. GT Academy driver Jann Mardenborough was able to set a time 3/10ths slower than the sister car to put him Chilton and Pla in 13^th. Lucas Ordonez and Mark Shulzitskiy, other GT Academy drivers with Tsugio Matsuda only managed to qualify 15^th behind the fastest KCMG Oreca 05-Nissan LMP2 car of Howson/Lapierre/Bradley.

Karun Chandok, the sole driver representing India driving the Murphy Oreca 03R-Nissan car with Berthon and Patterson managed to qualify 22^nd overall in the LMP category and 8^th in the highly populated LMP2 category.

Aston Martin Racing displayed their might by qualifying in pole for both GTE Pro and GTE Am categories. Le Mans ‘rookie’ Richie Stanaway posted the fastest lap and putting the #99 Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE on pole. In the GTE Am class, Pedro Lamy set the fastest time in the #98 Vantage GTE, 1.5 seconds ahead of the entire GTE Am class pack, and will start from third place overall in the GT race.

Though the #63 Corvette Racing C7.R qualified 7^th overall, Chevrolet has pulled the car out of the race after the car suffered a crash during the qualifying session with Jan Magnussen behind the wheel. After the incident the session was stopped to clear the track and the car of Magnussen/Garcia/Briscoe will not compete in the race this weekend.

The ‘Greatest race of all” will start at 1500hrs local time on Saturday June 13, which calculates to 1830hrs IST on the same day. The race will conclude at exactly 24 hours on Sunday June 14, from the moment the first car that crosses the line to start the race.

POS	DRIVERS	CAR	TIME	CATEGORY
1*	Jani/Lieb/Dumas	Porsche 919 Hybrid	3m 16.887s	LMP1
2	Webber/Hartley/Bernhard	Porsche 919 Hybrid	3m 17.767s	LMP1
3	Hulkenberg/Tandy/Bamber	Porsche 919 Hybrid	3m 18.862s	LMP1
4	Duval/di Grassi/Jarvis	Audi Sport Team Joest R18 e-tron	3m 19.866s	LMP1
5	Lotterer/Fassler/Treluyer	Audi Sport Team Joest R18 e-tron	3m 20.561s	LMP1
6	Albuquerque/Bonanomi/Rast	Audi Sport Team Joest R18 e-tron	3m 20.997s	LMP1
7	Wurz/Conway/Sarrazin	Toyota Gazoo TS040 Hybrid	3m 23.543s	LMP1
8	Wurz/Conway/Sarrazin	Toyota Gazoo TS040 Hybrid	3m 23.767s	LMP1
9	Heidfeld/Prost/Beche	Rebellion R-ONE AER	3m 26.874s	LMP1
10	Imperatori/Abt/Kraihamer	Rebellion R-ONE AER	3m 28.930s	LMP1
11	Monteiro/Trummer/Kaffer	ByKolles CLM P1/01 AER	3m 36.825s	LMP1
12	Tincknell/Krumm/Buncombe	Nissan GT-R LM Nismo	3m 36.995s	LMP1
13	Mardenborough/Chilton/Pla	Nissan GT-R LM Nismo	3m 37.291s	LMP1
14*	Howson/Lapierre/Bradley	KCMG Oreca 05-Nissan	3m 38.032s	LMP2
15	Ordonez/Matsuda/Shulzitskiy	Nissan GT-R LM Nismo	3m 39.992s	LMP1
16	Rusinov/Canal/Bird	G-Drive Ligier-Nissan	3m 38.939s	LMP2
17	Lancaster/Paletou/Hirsch	Greaves Gibson-Nissan	3m 38.958s	LMP2
18	Turvey/Evans/Dolan	Jota Gibson-Nissan	3m 39.004s	LMP2
19	Panciatici/Chatin/Cappillaire	Signatech Alpine Nissan	3m 39.609s	LMP2
20	Thiriet/Badey/Gommendy	Thiriet by TDS Oreca 05-Nissan	3m 39.923s	LMP2
21	Cumming/Vanthoor/Estre	OAK Ligier-Honda	3m 40.058	LMP2
22	Chandhok/Berthon/Patterson	Murphy Oreca 03R-Nissan	3m 40.690s	LMP2
23	Yacaman/Derani/Gonzalez	G-Drive Ligier-Nissan	3m 40.967s	LMP2
24	Webb/Ragues/Amberg	SARD-Morand Morgan-SARD	3m 41.250s	LMP2
25	Tung/Cheng/Roussel	Pegasus Morgan-Nissan	3m 42.023s	LMP2
26	Mediani/Minassian/Markozov	SMP BR01-Nissan	3m 42.077s	LMP2
27	Watts/Kane/Leventis	Strakka DOME-Nissan	3m 42.237s	LMP2
28	Aleshin/Ladygin/Ladygin	SMP BR01-Nissan	3m 42.417s	LMP2
29	Sharp/Dalziel/Heinemeier	ESM Ligier-Honda	3m 42.453s	LMP2
30	Brown/van Overbeek/Fogarty	ESM Ligier-Honda	3m 44.631s	LMP2
31	Krohn/Jonsson/Barbosa	Krohn Ligier-Judd	3m 44.854s	LMP2
32	Ibanez/Perret/Bellarosa	Ibanez Oreca 03R-Nissan	3m 45.350s	LMP2
33	Nicolet/Merlin/Maris	OAK Ligier-Nissan	3m 52.843s	LMP2
34*	MacDowall/Stanaway/Rees	Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE	3m 54.928s	GTE Pro
35	Bruni/Vilander/Fisichella	AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia	3m 55.028s	GTE Pro
36*	Lamy/Lauda/Dalla Lana	Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE	3m 55.102s	GTE Am
37	Turner/Mucke/Bell	Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE	3m 55.466s	GTE Pro
38	Rigon/Calado/Beretta	AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia	3m 55.582s	GTE Pro
39	Sorensen/Thiim/Nygaard	Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE	3m 55.783s	GTE Pro
40	Magnussen/Garcia/Briscoe	Corvette Racing C7.R	3m 55.963s	GTE Pro
41	Lietz/Christensen/Bergmeister	Porsche Team Manthay 911 RSR	3m 56.618s	GTE Pro
42	Aguas/Perrodo/Collard	AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia	3m 56.723s	GTE Am
43	Shaitar/Bertolini/Basov	SMP Ferrari 458 Italia	3m 56.877s	GTE Am
44	Pilet/Makowiecki/Henzler	Porsche Team Manthay 911 RSR	3m 56.877s	GTE Pro
45	Gavin/Milner/Taylor	Corvette Racing C7.R	3m 56.922s	GTE Pro
46	Bleekemolen/Keating/Miller	Riley TI Auto Dodge Viper GTS-R	3m 57.836s	GTE Am
47	Dempsey/Long/Seefried	Dempsey-Proton Porsche 911 RSR	3m 57.842s	GTE Am
48	Ried/Al Quabisi/Bachler	Abu Dhabi-Proton Porsche 911 RSR	3m 58.259s	GTE Am
49	Cameron/Griffin/Mortimer	AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia	3m 58.433s	GTE Am
50	Mann/Gianmaria/Cressoni	AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia	3m 58.695s	GTE Am
51	Sweedler/Bell/Segal	Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 458 Italia	3m 58.946s	GTE Am
52	Roda/Ruberti/Poulsen	Larbre Chevrolet Corvette C7.R	3m 59.522s	GTE Am
53	al Faisal/Giermaziak/Avenatti	JMW Ferrari 458 Italia	3m 59.612s	GTE Am
54	Hall/Goethe/Castellacci	Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE	4m 01.146s	GTE Am
55	Maassen/Chen/Kapadia	Team AAI Porsche 911 GT3 RSR	4m 01.243s	GTE Am
56	Chen/Vannelet/Parisy	Team AAI Porsche 911 GT3 RSR	4m 01.270s	GTE Am

Overall Pole - *

Category Pole - *

Picture Courtesy: www.fiawec.com

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