Anyone else glued to SpeedHD to watch this thing live? It's amazing! Four classes, one track, 24 hours. Porsche cars seem to be doing well in their class, with my boy, Patrick Long (he is just 28 years old!) in the RSR tonight. The Porsche's do well at night.

In the top class, Peugeot is running 1-2.
CATTMAN

 

I've been watching since coverage started at 8:30...sort of by accident, now it's become a problem. ...i'm hoping for an extended corvette pitstop or i'm never gonna hear the end of it from my buddy.


-Alex

 

Nice story about the reason why they stopped the driver's running start: it was the literal running of the driver's that led to Porsche having their ignition on the left of the wheel, so that the driver could get the car started and into gear without delay. It was that immediacy that led to the death of a driver on turn 1, as he didn't bother to strap himself in.

They also keep talking about the value of proper tire pressure.

Interesting!

Love the LED's on these cars. And the HANS is great to see here, too. So they had to stop one of the Audi's, and couldn't restart it due to heatsink!

This is ***** to the wall!
CATTMAN

 

I think now is when we're going to see cars start dropping like flies. The drivers seem to have settled down though, which is good...there were some real boneheaded maneuvers earlier on. It's going to get really interesting!


-Alex

 

To the OP: it is "Les 24 Heures du Mans." The noun "heures" is plural for "heure" which means "hours." Therefore, the article "le" must agree in number and its plural form is "les" for both a feminine or masculine noun - the noun "heures" is feminine and plural. The possessive "of" in French is "de" but, when it precedes the article "le" as in "Le Mans" it becomes "du" (du= de+le) all by itself without writing "du le" as it would mean "of the the". I hope this is not considered as fastidious from my part, though.

 

I knew the reason for the left side ignition but I didn't know about the driver fatality.

I've watched bits and pieces of race in the past however this year I've watched most of it and the coverage is very impressive.

I suggest downloading and watching Audi "truth in 24" movie if you have not seen it.

 

Thanks! I always wondered about this myself since I do not speak French.

 

No problem! I am a languages enthusiast and try to point things out only to help others, not too be obnoxious or any other negative motive.

My main language is Spanish but the grammar for both French and Spanish is almost the same and that helps me out a lot with all the other Latin-based (Romance) languages.

 

A shame that teams from the ALMS were dominating GT2 (especially Corvette), then all end up retiring. Also disappointing was Peugeot's dominance in the race ending in technical failures, considering last year's run. It didn't help that Peugeot punted one of the Corvettes out of a class win.

BMW disappointed me, but they were using an LMS-spec car which did not use double-wishbone suspension. They also have a huge drag penalty (which isn't much of an issue in American tracks) and supposedly a much smaller air restrictor.

That said, you race for 24 hours, and congratulations to Felbermayr Proton. Porsche hasn't had much luck w/ the 997 GT3 RSR at Le Mans until now. Even Henzler stated that they could not keep up w/ the Corvette and Ferrari after just two hours into the race.

Kudos for the Farnbacher Ferrari on Hankook tires as well; that will serve as a huge development/advertisement for the tire company.

 

Thought there was just too much time on the top Peugots and Audis and not enough coverage of Gt1 or GT2. BMW had the new art car - hardly saw except when the other car crashed out making the wrong move not to get around it.

 

The other car, driven by 8 time winner Tom Kristienson, was committed to the outside line, as the slow moving damaged BMW looked to be traveling off line to the inside. THe BMW changed lines, not sure why, and hence the audi needed to go off to avoid a collision.

 

Good excerpt from Motorosport.com:

Stuttgart/Atlanta - June 13 -- The success story of the 2010 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR race continues at the 78 running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans as factory drivers Marc Lieb (Germany), Richard Lietz (Austria) and Wolf Henzler (Germany) piloted their German Felbermayr-Proton Porsche to a two-lap GT2 win over the second-place Ferrari earlier today.

Two other Porsche factory drivers Timo Bernhard (Germany) and Romain Dumas (France) - on loan from Porsche to Audi's factory prototype effort - helped lead Audi's sweep of the overall podium. They drove with former Porsche factory pilot Mike Rockenfeller (Germany) to a one-lap victory in their Audi R15 TDI. All six LMP1 and GT2-winning drivers have either victories or championships in the American Le Mans Series as well.

As for the worldwide performance of the Porsche 911 GT3 RSR so far this year, the car that won the 24 hour race in Dubai and holds the championship lead of the Le Mans Series (Europe) and the American Le Mans Series, and was the most successful GT race car of 2009 has now won the GT2 class of the Le Mans 24 hour race.

This victory at Le Mans marks the 98th win (class and overall) for Porsche at the prestigious long distance classic. For the ninth time, a race car based on the street legal 911 GT3 prevailed over its rivals. Positions three, five, seven and eight also went to drivers of the 450 hp Porsche. Moreover, the winning 911 also clinched the environmental "Michelin Green X Challenge" award as the GT car with the best efficiency.

The basis for Porsche's success was this year again the reliability of the 911 GT3 RSR. Refueling, new tires, driver changes - the team mechanics of had nothing more to do from start to finish.


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CATTMAN

 

1st) I wonder if Porsche is less motivated to build a P1 car due to the link with Audi through the VW group? With 16 outright victories, I would think they'd want to put a few more in the bank if possible to maintain undisputed #1 status. Audi has now matched Ferrari with 9.

2nd) One board member mentioned BMW's poor performance. The Rahal Letterman team has been a force so far in ALMS with the M3. Was this a different spec car? Was it more restricted by different regs?

3rd) What a shame for Peugeot. Apparently if multiple cars suffered engine failures, then it suggests they didn't deserve the win, but for Audi to simply inherit the 1-2-3 is not the real picture of the race. I laughed out loud when Alan McNish explained the links to Audi road cars citing the LED headlights used from the R8!! Clearly Audi is a talented manufacturer, but their road cars are a far far different product than their racing machines, unlike you know who...

DRP

 

+1 I thought the coverage was terrible - not nearly enough time spent on GT-2 (which was the best competition and what most people can connect with).

 

Aside from maybe not wanting to compete with Audi for an overall win, I would think that Porsche's new 918 concept car would make an excellent platform for an assault on P1, especially since the effort would come with a car that more than likely will become a (high dollar) factory production number. Does Porsche have deep enough pockets to support a multi-year multi-car factory endeavor?