Oreca were off the pace in qualifying

Aston Martin
Oreca
David Brabham
Guy Smith
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Aston Martin
Le Mans, 11 June, 2009. Qualifying for the 77th Le Mans
24 Hours took place on Thursday evening during two sessions, from 7pm to 9pm and from 10pm to midnight. After a rain-affected free practice on Wednesday night, conditions for qualifying were dry, enabling the cars to run on slick tyres for the first time on the 13.4-kilometre circuit.

Although start position is not so critical at the Le Mans 24 Hours, during which the cars are expected to cover more than 5000 kilometres in approximately 360 laps, all the teams are eager to benefit from the prestige of pole position. With the diesel cars enjoying their expected margin of superiority, Aston Martin Racing's three factory LMP1 entries will line up seventh, eighth and 17th on the grid for Saturday's race.

The 007 car of Jan Charouz (CZ), Tomas Enge (CZ) and Stefan Mucke (DE) was the quickest Aston Martin with a time of 3m27.180s, qualifying in eighth overall. The sister 008 car of Anthony Davidson (GB), Darren Turner (GB) and Jos Verstappen (NL) was ninth with a time of 3m27.704, while the 009 car of Stuart Hall (GB), Peter Kox (NL) and Harold Primat (CH) qualified 17th after setting a time of 3m33.968s.

The Speedy Racing Sebah team, running last year's Aston Martin-powered Lola, was third quickest of the petrol cars, meaning that Aston Martin engines occupy the top three petrol-powered places on the Le Mans grid this year.

"I used the first two hours of the session just to get used to driving the car in the dry," said Stefan Mucke, who set the 007 car's best time to place it eighth on the grid. "With free practice having been held in mixed conditions yesterday, this was our first chance to have some normal dry running. In the second part of the session I wasn't really going for a quick lap time, as our focus is firmly on the race. But the car felt very good and I was pleased with the time we produced, despite the fact that we were held up by a lot of traffic. It's a sign of the progress that has been made but the gap remains too big: there are clearly still two classes in LMP1, petrol and diesel. Our aim was always to be the quickest of the petrol cars and I'm delighted that we have achieved our goal so far. This makes me quite confident of our race pace, so I think we have the chance to do well."

The 007 crew encountered a setback towards the end of the session, when Jan Charouz went off at the second chicane on the Mulsanne straight and damaged the car. However, initial examination shows the chassis to be intact, so the car will be repaired in time for the start of Saturday's race.

Anthony Davidson set the fastest time in the 008 car, on his debut with Aston Martin Racing. "I'm very pleased with our performance, although it was far from an ideal lap," said the Englishman. "I had serious traffic and this is still a different style of racing to what I have been used to recently. However, I think our race pace is more indicative of our potential than qualifying, so this is very encouraging for the weekend. We've got very good straight line speed, which is going to help us deal with all the traffic during the race."

Peter Kox set the best time in the 009 car on his final timed lap of the session just before midnight. In GT1 the customer Jetalliance Racing team was third, while the Drayson Racing team qualified their Vantage GT2 ninth in class.

The 77th Le Mans 24 Hours will get underway at 3pm on Saturday 13 June.
Oreca
Oreca follows its game plan...

After yesterday's wet practice sessions Team ORECA-Matmut-AIM concentrated on preparing for the race during qualifying.

Hugues de Chaunac's message was loud and clear: the priorities in qualifying were to establish the best race set up for the cars and not to chase after a fast time. The two ORECA 01 drivers followed his recommendations and transformed the qualifying session into a profitable work session.

After Wednesday's wet practice sessions that were greatly affected by the variable weather conditions, the two prototypes developed at Singes have put a lot of kilometres on the clock. Stephane Ortelli in car No.10 set the car up. Le Mans winner in 1998, Stephane has benefited from his past experience here in Le Mans: " In a relatively short period of time we have been able to develop a very competitive car for the race. ORECA 01 is stable, a pleasure to drive and is easy on the tyres. These three elements are extremely important in Le Mans. We still have a few more details to improve but have progressed continuously. It has been very beneficial session for us. His team mates Bruno Senna and Tiago Monteiro continued to discover the circuit in the LMP1 class, rolling out very fast laps.

In No.11 Olivier Panis concentrated on improving the car's set up. "ORECA 01 is well balanced" confirmed the former F1 driver. " But we still have small difficulties with the grip" His impressions were shared by Soheil Ayari and Nicolas Lapierre who drove the majority of the second half: " There is not a lot of grip when the track is fresh. We became more and more performant as the track became more used. We also need to optimise the traction, but the car is handling really well. We are quite good in the fast corners and we have progressed in Vmax. "

At the end of qualifying, ORECA 01 sits on the 8th line on the starting grid, Hugues de Chaunac, Group ORECA President, explained: " We were not seeking performance, but to have a comfortable car for the race.. Our position on the grid is really not important: and as predicted the " Diesel " are well ahead and the Aston Martin's have taken advantage of the rules. We are going to keep to our strategy: to race our race, relying on the cars reliability. We are going to spend the least amount of time in the stands and be there at the finish line with our two prototypes. "

David Brabham
Friday 12 June 2009, UK; Sports car star David Brabham is fully focussed and ready to tackle his 16th career Le Mans
24 Hours race after valuable running time in the Peugeot 908 HDi FAP saw the British-born Australian deliver solid qualifying and practice sessions in the run up to Saturday's epic event.

The 43 year-old double Le Mans GT1 class winner and current LMP1 American Le Mans Series championship leader ran as high as second overall in the final half hour of the first qualifying period on Thursday evening. Brabham set a fastest time of 3'27.026 around the 8.4 mile La Sarthe circuit, just 2.174 seconds off the leading #8 Peugeot, before finishing his stint in third and handing over to team mate Marc Gene.

Equally as important as setting promising qualifying times was the opportunity for Brabham to glean valuable race set-up data and particularly to try out different tyre strategies.

"Qualifying is essentially practice at Le Mans and our main focus today was getting a good race set-up and tyre evaluation," said Brabham. "We achieved everything we wanted to in today's sessions. The other two cars went a little more for qualifying pace but we are very happy that we now have a good race car. We'll be working on a couple of things tomorrow for Saturday's warm up and we'll see what those changes give us in terms of set-up.

"Today was the longest time I've had in the car here so far, so that was really valuable. The track was pretty greasy and dirty in my first stint but as the evening wore on and the track cleaned up, the times just got better and better. I haven't driven a prototype around here for a few years so it took some time to get used to it but I quickly got into a rhythm.

"It's great to see Peugeot on pole and it's clear that there isn't much between us and the Audis, so it's going to be a cracking race. Le Mans really is the pinnacle of my year and it's getting close now. I'm racing with a great team, in a great car, driving with great team mates and working with a fantastic group of people, so I'm really looking forward to the race."

Marc Gene qualified the #9 Team Peugeot Total car in fifth position while the sister Peugeots took pole position and third. Today's positive form leaves Brabham optimistic of achieving his dream of taking his first LMP1 win and third consecutive Le Mans class spoils to join an elite band of drivers to claim victory in different classes.

The flag will fall to start the 2009 race battle at 3pm local time on Saturday 13 June. Tune into live online radio
coverage at www.radiolemans.com. For further information on the Le Mans 24 Hours, including live timing and full results, visit www.lemans.org
Guy Smith
The British-built Ginetta-Zytek that Yorkshireman Guy Smith drives in the Le Mans
24 Hours will start the race on Saturday (2pm BST) from fifth place on the LM P2 category grid.

Smith, from Beverley, won the 2003 Le Mans race outright in a Bentley but for the second consecutive year, bids for LM P2 class glory with the Portuguese Quifel-ASM team.

The 34-year-old Yorkshireman again teams-up with Olivier Pla (F) and Miguel Paes do Amaral (Por) at Le Mans but this year driving a new Ginetta-Zytek 09S sportscar.

Pla set the 25th overall fastest time in the 55-car field, clocking a time of 3mins 42.012secs around the 8.47-mile track but more importantly the fifth best time in the 12-car LM P2 category.

Guy commented: "Initially the car was very nervous -- I was driving with a wet set-up from the previous evening [Wednesday]. We then changed it for the second part of the four-hour session and Olivier did a good job.

"Unfortunately he encountered traffic on his fastest lap so we should have been closer to the class pole-sitting Porsche.

"But we've got a pretty good race car after Wednesday's six-hour session and tonight's four hour time trial which should give us a shot at a class podium come Sunday afternoon."