It’s not often a young driver goes to Le Mans and finishes second his debut at the French endurance classic, in only his first year in an LMP2 car.
Except that’s exactly what Ollie Gray has done. The 20-year-old, racing for VDS Panis Racing in the #48 Oreca 07-Gibson, finished second in the LMP2 class alongside his teammates Esteban Masson and veteran sportscar racer Franck Perera.
The team led for a significant period of time during the race, with a gap of up to a minute and half at one point duering the night. Unfortunately, as is is common in endurance racing, the only safety of the race eliminated that gap.
“Great race overall, we all drove great throughout the race, pulling a minute and a half gap about 10 hours into the race, when a safety car took that away from us,” said Gray.
“We were then in P2 coming into the closing stages of the race. We had to go full attack to put pressure on the leader and force a mistake, which we did.”
The leading car at the time, the #43 Inter Europol Oreca — which would go on to win the race — had Nick Yelloly at the wheel. However, through the relentless pace of Masson, in the car for the last stint, Yelloly received a drive-through penalty.
This put Masson in the lead, and would give Gray a win on his Le Mans debut. But there was more drama to come.
“We found ourselves in the lead with 20 minutes to go. when suspension failure stopped us from getting that win in Le Mans,” said Gray.
So, heartbreak for the young Brit and his two teammates. While second is still a huge achievement at Le Mans, it’s not the win — especially when they were leading with well under half an hour left to race.
However, Gray is staying positive. “We can all be proud of the job we did over the last week and we will come back stronger,” he finished.
Faster and more laps than Perera
Gray did 123 laps through the race, recording a fastest time of 3:37.373. This compares favourably to teammate Masson, in the car for 158 laps, setting a fastest time of 3:36.610. That’s just over six tenths quicker than Gray.
However, the Briton was faster and did more laps than 41-year-old Perera, 21 years Gray’s senior. Perera did 86 laps through the course of the race, with a fastest lap of 3:37.775 for the Frenchman.
This makes Gray’s lap four tenths quicker than Perera – a huge achievement for the young Briton.
We’ll have a full interview with Gray in the coming weeks, to discuss his European Le Mans Series, goals and dreams for racing, and his career before sportscars. Watch this space!
