James Calado leads in the #51 Ferrari 499P at the halfway point in Le Mans’ centenary race.
A safety car period caused by the retiring #7 Toyota GR010-Hybrid took the field into the early hours of Sunday morning, with Nico Müller in the #94 Peugeot 9X8 leading the field when the race went to green. Shortly thereafter Daniil Kyvatt in the #63 Prema LMP2 car had a heavy crash into the barriers at the Porsche Curves, bringing out a full course yellow.
During the full course yellow, Antonio Fuoco’s #50 Ferrari 499P entered the pit garage with a leak in the ERS coolant system, and ultimately fell six laps down whilst repairs were carried out. Müller briefly lost the lead when the field went to green, being overtaken by the #51 Ferrari of Alessandro Pier Guidi. The Italian then pitted, and the Peugeot of Müller had its lead reinstated.
With just over 13 and a half hours of the race remaining, Sebastian Buemi in the #8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid, passed Müller in the #94 Peugeot 9X8 for the lead. This left Müller in a fight for second with #51 Ferrari 499P of James Calado as Peugeot continued to show they can fight at the front on merit. Calado inherited second place with 13 hours and 20 minutes left on the race clock.
The race saw a further slow zone incident as the eleventh hour of the race came to a close with Jan Magnussen collecting the barriers on the Mulsanne straight in the #32 Inter Europol Oreca-07 Gibson LMP2 machine. The #94 Peugeot’s battle at the front then hit a major speed bump as Gustavo Menezes hit the barrier at the first Mulsanne chicane, ten minutes into the twelfth hour. Menezes was able to recover the 9X8 to the pits, having incurred lots of damage to the front right corner. Now 8 laps down on the leader, the #93’s chances of victory have been dashed, in what has been a heartbreaking turn of fortune for the French marque.
As the second half of the race approaches, James Calado holds an approximate four and a half second lead in his #51 Ferrari 499P over the #8 Toyota GR010 – Hybrid of Sebastian Buemi in second place overall. In third place is Richard Westbrook in the #2 Cadillac V-Series.R, over a minute off of the lead. In fourth is the #6 Porsche 963 of André Lotterer. Scott Dixon rounds out the top five in the #3 Cadillac V-Series.R and Paul Di Resta is now the lead Peugeot in sixth place.
Neil Jani leads the LMP2 field in the #30 Duqueine Team Oreca 07-Gibson with Job Van Uitert second in the #65 Panis Racing outfit. The top three in LMP2 is rounded out by Reshad De Géreus in Cool Racing’s #47 Oreca-07 Gibson.
It’s Porsche, Ferrari, Ferrari in GTE-Am. PJ Hyett leads in the #56 Project 1-AO Porsche 911 RSR ahead of Thomas Flohr and Scott Huffaker in the #54 and #57 Ferrari 488 GTE Evos.
The race thus far has been jam packed full of incidents, with only 48 of the 62 starters left in the field. In 2022, 53 managed to take the chequered flag, showing that this year’s Le Mans is truly a war of attrition.
Sunrise is just around the corner, will the sun still be shining on Calado and the #51 Ferrari once this great race is run?
