Peugeot are frustrated with their performance in qualifying for Le Mans, with both cars eliminated from the first of three sessions on Wednesday evening.
“Of course it is extremely frustrating, to move from competition for pole in Imola and Spa to, for the home race, to be 2 tenths per kilometre away from the pace,” team principal Emmanuel Esnault told media, including Motorsport Week, minutes after the session ended.
“So it’s extremely frustrating, but that’s racing. So we don’t give up. We’ve got a race to prepare, qualifying is not everything of course, but you can imagine…”
Peugeot qualified 16th and 18th out of 18 cars, with the #93 of Stoffel Vandoorne setting a 3:24.978 and Malthe Jakobsen a 3:25.660, 1.8 and 2.5 seconds off #35 Alpine’s Ferdinand Habsburg’s fastest lap of 3:23.135. The 15 cars that were not eliminated will go through to Hyperpole 1 tomorrow, where a further 5 will be eliminated, followed by Hyperpole 2, a top 10 shoot out for pole.
Asked by Motorsport Week where the car was lacking pace, Esnault said, “It’s across the lap basically. But it’s a the same package, the same people, the same car as we had over the past two races.”
Both drivers changed tyres during the 30 minute session in a bid to find some grip and time out on track, but to no avail. Vandoorne in the #93 used two sets of mediums all session, while Jakobsen used a soft set first, then medium post-pit stop mid session.
The single glimmer of hope for Peugeot is that they are closer to the pace than last year’s qualifying at Le Mans, where their fastest car was 2.2 seconds off the pace.
“It looks similar from last year in terms of pace, even if the gap was was closer [compared] to last year, but we cannot be happy with that. Of course as you can imagine when you are a racer and when you are representing a brand like Peugeot with such a rich heritage, as I said, it’s not the way we want to race.”
Peugeot looking ahead to the race
Asked how Peugeot approaches the race after the less-than-ideal qualifying, Esnault was diplomatic.
“think the key the key point now starting from from the back is to survive,” said the Frenchman.
“To survive and to be opportunistic. As usual, try to execute on the best possible way and to give a clean sheet in term of operation, speed, stop strategy, etc.
“We will have to be opportunistic anyway. We’ve got nothing to lose. When you start from the back, it’s… let’s be clever. Let’s prepare the car properly, and put the drivers in the right mindset. So, that’s what we have to do now,” he concluded.
READ MORE: Ferdinand Habsburg fastest in 24H Le Mans qualifying
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