24h Le Mans 2018
Friday April 20, 2018: starting grid
Even if Team # 11 SRC Kawasaki was able to secure the pole position, it remains to be seen whether Guarnoni will be able to take part in the race. The Frenchman fell and had to go to the medical center.
Second place on the grid went to Mandy Kainz's Austrian team. The # 7 YART Yamaha was on average only 0.155 seconds slower than the Kawasaki at the front. The Australian Broc Parkes, the German Marvin Fritz and the Japanese Takuya Fujita hit an incredibly high pace.
Starting place three went to Germany: Ingo Nowacyzk's NRT48 team drove with the French Kenny Foray, the British Peter Hicklman and the German Lucy Glöckner to an average of 1: 37.338 minutes. GMT 94 (Mike di Meglio, Niccolo Canepa, David Checa) and the record world champions # 2 SERT (Vincent Philippe, Etienne Masson, Gregg Black) rounded off the top five.
Rico Penzkofer's team finished ninth on the grid with the three Britons Michael Laverty, Christian Iddon and Danny Webb, while the Bolliger-Kawasaki came in 13th with Roman Stamm, Robin Mulhauser and Sebastien Suchet. GERT56 from Pirna (Horst Saiger, Julian Puffe, Rico Löwe) got the 22nd starting place.
Thursday, April 19, 2018: 1st qualifying
This year Le Mans has the best weather in ages . 'In the last ten years I haven't experienced anything like this, really hot, really awesome,' said Frenchman Kenny Foray to motorradonline.de. However, the high temperatures also caused many falls. The free practice session on Thursday morning had to take part a total of six times Some tire manufacturers in particular were surprised and packed for the usual cool temperatures. Poker started on Thursday.
In free practice, the # 9 Tecmas-BMW team set the fastest time The French ended up just ahead of the # 11 Team SRC Kawasaki and the # 5 FCC TSR Honda France with a time of 1: 37.015 minutes. The NRT48 team with Kenny Foray, Peter Hickman and Lucy Glöckner landed as the new BMW works spearhead and reserve driver Stefan Kerschbaumer in sixth. On the other hand, the # 13 Penz-BMW had problems, as it had to take the emergency exit back to the pits twice during the session the S 1000 RR purred again flawlessly.
Qualifying 1: the maneuvering begins
For some years in the long-haul World Championship regulates the tires and so only limited contingents are available to the teams in the EWC and STK classes. Therefore, many teams decided onOnly a few laps on Thursday afternoon, as the temperature tomorrow morning should be cooler and therefore more grip. The best time of the day was delivered by Julien da Costa from the TECMAS-BMW (# 9) team. His time was 1: 37.013 minutes. The German Marvin Fritz was narrowly beaten, with a 1: 37.043 on the YART-Yamaha # 7. In the first qualifying there was more discipline overall than in free practice, because there was only one red flag in the passage for driver 2.
On average, however - the fastest times of all three drivers are taken and divided by three - The provisional pole position went to Team SRC Kawasaki with starting number # 11. Randy de Puniet, Mathieu Gines and Jeremy Guarnoni finished at 1: 37.925 minutes. The provisional second place on the grid went to # 5 FCC TSR Honda ahead of # 9 TECMAS-BMW. Ingo Nowaczyk's team # 48 NRT48 from Oschersleben came in fifth. GMT94 finished sixth in front of the record world champions of # 2 SERT.
Toni Börner
The GERT56 team from Pirna got the preliminary 23rd place on the grid.
The # 111 Honda Racing, # 13 Benz and # 21 Mercury Racing rounded off the top -Ten off. # 8 Team Bolliger Racing finished in 15th place, the GERT56 team from Pirna got the provisional 23rd place on the grid. Motobox Kremer # 65 came in 26th, WSB-Endurance # 99 in 33rd and the Hertrampf-Ducati # 100 landed on 37th. It is particularly gratifying that SERT's long-distance veteran Dominique Meliand is back after a long heart disease. The legendary team boss presented himself recovered, strengthened and fit at the Le Mans racetrack.
The German Arnaud Friedrich, who should start for the LRP Poland # 90 team, is currently doomed to watch. He won't celebrate his 18th birthday until Saturday. He was supposed to take part in the race, but the French federation has refused to give him permission to start. All levers are currently being set in motion so that the Saxon can qualify in the warm-up on Sunday and still start.
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