Grand Prix Rejects

Another huge crash, this time for the #30 HVM Status GP Lola (co-owned by none other than Keith Wiggins). However thankfully Burgess appears to be okay, he walked out of the car himself.

The whole rear end of the car is a wreck. Engine and gearbox jettisoned. Car caught fire briefly. Scary stuff.

14 hours in. The weariness is starting to set in.

Man, that is some awful news to return home to. RIP Allan

Karun Chandhok wrote:Did a mammoth 3:50 hours night shift !!

What is the longest ever shift a driver has done?

Shizuka wrote:

Karun Chandhok wrote:Did a mammoth 3:50 hours night shift !!

What is the longest ever shift a driver has done?

Back in the 1952, Pierre Levegh trying to do the 24 hours alone. He had an engine failure during the last hour. So he did 23 Hours.

That's mighty.

Shizuka wrote:

Karun Chandhok wrote:Did a mammoth 3:50 hours night shift !!

What is the longest ever shift a driver has done?

Louis Rosier drove 23 hours and 15 minutes in 1950, Raymond Sommer drove 20 hours in 1932, but Pierre Levegh drove almost the whole race in 1952 by himself, only to retire in the final hour after missing a downshift due to fatigue.

No. 99 Aston Martin GTE Pro crashes at Tertre Rouge, in eerily similar circumstances to Simonsen's fatal accident earlier in the race. Front end of the car obliterated, showering the track in debris.

Fortunately, Makowiecki, the driver, escaped with little to no injuries.

What a crazy half hour or so.

It started to rain, the 7 Toyota went nose first into the wall and has limped to the pits (still in the garage) the lead LMP2 car spun in the rain and carried on, the GT battle was ripped apart. It was so bad a LMP2 car did a 360 aquaplane spin pass on the Audi number 1, it was awesome.

Meanwhile Aston Martin decided to piss away the race by pitting twice in 2 laps and going from wet, dry, wet, dry.

50 minutes remaining...I don't even know what's going on anymore.

I'm absolutely exhausted.

tommykl wrote:

Shizuka wrote:

Karun Chandhok wrote:Did a mammoth 3:50 hours night shift !!

What is the longest ever shift a driver has done?

Louis Rosier drove 23 hours and 15 minutes in 1950, Raymond Sommer drove 20 hours in 1932, but Pierre Levegh drove almost the whole race in 1952 by himself, only to retire in the final hour after missing a downshift due to fatigue.

Nowadays maximum for one driver is 14 hours, and in 6-hour window driver can drive for 4 hours.

22 minutes left, Buemi unlaps himself, with more rain on the way. Audi look to have it in the bag, but if Seb can pull it off it would be the greatest comeback of all time.

Massive,massive rainstorm to come in as the clock strikes 23 hours 45 minutes. Disgonbgud.

Buemi let the Audi go back by.

The Victory of the 90th Le Mans 24 Hours belongs to the number 2 Audi Sport Team Joset, Etron Quattro.
Piloted by:
Tom Kristensen (DK) Allan McNish (GBR) and Loic Duval (FRA)

Race over. Saw the finish which was nice. Tom Kristensen picks up his 9th(!) LeMans win, one lap ahead of #8 Toyita driven by Buemi. #1 Audi finishes 3rd. As for Aston Martin, they got their car home in 3rd, after agreeing to race on after Allen Simonsen's unfortunate fatal accident.

Don't know how many problems the first two cars had during the 24 hours, but the Toyota did 4 less stops and finished just one lap behind. They're getting closer to a win.

Audi wins again. Aston threw away their class victory to Porsche. Toyota racks up a third second place.

Hooray. I'm going to bed.

AdrianSutil wrote:Race over. Saw the finish which was nice. Tom Kristensen picks up his 9th(!) LeMans win, one lap ahead of #8 Toyita driven by Buemi. #1 Audi finishes 3rd. As for Aston Martin, they got their car home in 3rd, after agreeing to race on after Allen Simonsen's unfortunate fatal accident.

Don't know how many problems the first two cars had during the 24 hours, but the Toyota did 4 less stops and finished just one lap behind. They're getting closer to a win.

The number 3 Audi was 3rd. The number 1 Audi lost 12 laps after alternator issues and finished the race in 5th. The number 7 Toyota was 4th.

Congratulations to Audi no. 2 of Kristensen, McNish, and Duval. Also for the winners of LMP2, GtePro and GteAm class. RIP to Allan Simonsen

Shadaza wrote:

AdrianSutil wrote:Race over. Saw the finish which was nice. Tom Kristensen picks up his 9th(!) LeMans win, one lap ahead of #8 Toyita driven by Buemi. #1 Audi finishes 3rd. As for Aston Martin, they got their car home in 3rd, after agreeing to race on after Allen Simonsen's unfortunate fatal accident.

Don't know how many problems the first two cars had during the 24 hours, but the Toyota did 4 less stops and finished just one lap behind. They're getting closer to a win.

The number 3 Audi was 3rd. The number 1 Audi lost 12 laps after alternator issues and finished the race in 5th. The number 7 Toyota was 4th.

Ah my bad. Swear it was the #1 Audi in 3rd. Never mind.

Nice to see the top five separated by what? 12/13 laps? Close race then.

In the slightly fixed words of Gary Lineker:
Le Mans is a simple race; 168 men drive in circles for 24 hours and at the end, the Germans win.

Pointrox wrote:In the slightly fixed words of Gary Lineker:
Le Mans is a simple race; 56 men drive in circles for 24 hours and at the end, the Germans win.

Surely you mean 56 cars or 168 drivers...

And Bertrand Baguette wins the LMP2 class (with Rodriguez and Plowman)

I find him very underrated.

tommykl wrote:And Bertrand Baguette wins the LMP2 class (with Rodriguez and Plowman)

I find him very underrated.

He should have done better than 22nd in his year at IndyCar (though to be fair nobody could have done much with the Conquest!), and he seems to have faded himself into irrelevance until now. Good job on him and the team.

JeremyMcClean wrote:

tommykl wrote:And Bertrand Baguette wins the LMP2 class (with Rodriguez and Plowman)

I find him very underrated.

He should have done better than 22nd in his year at IndyCar (though to be fair nobody could have done much with the Conquest!), and he seems to have faded himself into irrelevance until now. Good job on him and the team.

Well, he did come within three laps of winning the Indy 500...

tommykl wrote:

JeremyMcClean wrote:

tommykl wrote:And Bertrand Baguette wins the LMP2 class (with Rodriguez and Plowman)

I find him very underrated.

He should have done better than 22nd in his year at IndyCar (though to be fair nobody could have done much with the Conquest!), and he seems to have faded himself into irrelevance until now. Good job on him and the team.

Well, he did come within three laps of winning the Indy 500...

Hildebrand came within one corner

Apologies, I had to say that lol

Audi win, again

Only just heard about Simonsen, RIP

Audi-Toyota-Audi-Toyota? not the worst finish i've seen.

Toyota was in contention all the way to the end. Considering they were only one lap down on the number 2 Audi, I think they did very well.

And that was a lovely post-24 hour race sleep, especially considering how hellish the racing was. At least 4 hours of armco repair? Unbelievable.

nome66 wrote:Audi-Toyota-Audi-Toyota? not the worst finish i've seen.

I'm glad the Toyotas finished. Better than last year.

Watching highlights right now. Heard about Simonsen yesterday evening while away. RIP Allan. We will miss you.
When I heard about the crash, I'm like, "Seriously, this again?!" Well, that's the way it is.

I think ROTR should be track/car safety. Yeah, the damage done to the #95 was kinda freakish but I think avoidable. The prototype crash in the Porsche curves when the car split in half can be prevented, seeing the engine separated itself completely. That thing on the inside of the second chicane that got a few cars airborne was just stupid and shouldn't have been there. Three separate barriers had to be fixed because of accidents, which I think is just excessive. More than enough for a 24 hour race.

Some of you might not have seen this, but Strakka have announced that they are withdrawing from the rest of the 2013 WEC Championship in order to focus on their plans for 2014 instead.
The decision is based on the fact that Strakka are almost out of spare parts for their current car thanks to an accident in qualifying for the Le Mans 24 Hours, and, with their current car becoming obsolete at the end of the year, they have decided that it is not worth producing new spare parts and it is cheaper for them to not compete. http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/108681

Added to that, Rebellion Racing also seem to have cut back their racing program - according to the ACO's website, Rebellion seem to have cut their ALMS campaign in favour of focussing on the R-One program for 2014. http://www.24h-lemans.com/en/news/strak ... 11615.html

Has anyone mentioned the fact that Robert Wickens scored his first win in DTM from pole at the Norisring yesterday?

good_Ralf wrote:Has anyone mentioned the fact that Robert Wickens scored his first win in DTM from pole at the Norisring yesterday?

A good victory for him, but unfortunately he had his chance two years ago with his FR 3.5 title but he somehow blew it with his DTM stint last year. To be honest, I don't know where it all went wrong for him.

Aerospeed [JerMcC] wrote:

good_Ralf wrote:Has anyone mentioned the fact that Robert Wickens scored his first win in DTM from pole at the Norisring yesterday?

A good victory for him, but unfortunately he had his chance two years ago with his FR 3.5 title but he somehow blew it with his DTM stint last year. To be honest, I don't know where it all went wrong for him.

When Red Bull decided that for some insane reason Jean-Eric Vergne was a better prospect despite Vergne losing out to Wickens in FR3.5. He does look a lot better in DTM this year, so Mercedes may try and get him into F1 yet.

Has Robert Wickens ever tested an F1 car? If not, it's a travesty. Would love to see him follow in the foot steps of di Resta at Force India (although if I were Force India, I'd be doing everything possible to get Jules Bianchi back and into the car in 2014).

watka wrote:Has Robert Wickens ever tested an F1 car? If not, it's a travesty. Would love to see him follow in the foot steps of di Resta at Force India (although if I were Force India, I'd be doing everything possible to get Jules Bianchi back and into the car in 2014).

I think he was Marussia's third driver a while back, might've done a Friday practice or two. If Mercedes were allowed to be at the Young Driver Test, we might've seen him out there, but as it is...

Salamander wrote:

watka wrote:Has Robert Wickens ever tested an F1 car? If not, it's a travesty. Would love to see him follow in the foot steps of di Resta at Force India (although if I were Force India, I'd be doing everything possible to get Jules Bianchi back and into the car in 2014).

I think he was Marussia's third driver a while back, might've done a Friday practice or two. If Mercedes were allowed to be at the Young Driver Test, we might've seen him out there, but as it is...

Wickens was third driver for Virgin/Marussia in Abu Dhabi in 2011.

Adrian Sutil to drive a factory Porsche LMP1 in 2014, apparently.

Faustus wrote:Adrian Sutil to drive a factory Porsche LMP1 in 2014, apparently.

Could this mean James Calado alongside DiResta at F.I

Faustus wrote:Adrian Sutil to drive a factory Porsche LMP1 in 2014, apparently.

Will he be Webber's teammate? It's sad if he is leaving F1.

good_Ralf wrote:

Faustus wrote:Adrian Sutil to drive a factory Porsche LMP1 in 2014, apparently.

Will he be Webber's teammate? It's sad if he is leaving F1.

Any reliable source?