Nakajima propels #8 Toyota to Le Mans pole
Two-time Formula 1 champion Fernando Alonso and Sebastien Buemi will start the 2018 Le Mans 24 Hours from pole position after team-mate Kazuki Nakajima secured the #8 Toyota pole position.
The team held provisional pole entering the final of three qualifying sessions after Nakajima had posted a 3m17.270s benchmark with his first lap on Wednesday evening.
The former F1 driver lowered his personal best dramatically on his first run in the final qualifying session, recording a 3m15.377s in the Toyota TS050 HYBRID.
Nakajima’s time was two seconds faster than Kamui Kobayashi’s fastest in the #7 car, which was recorded on the opening lap of Wednesday’s session.
Kobayashi did seem on course to improve in the #7 car, posting a session-best time in the middle sector immediately after Nakajima’s timesheet-topping effort. However, Kobayashi – who holds the Le Mans lap record – lost time in the final sector having encountered traffic.
The #7 squad failed to improve later in the evening but still secured second on the grid to ensure a Toyota front row lock-out.
Rain affected the second half of an extended two and a half hour session, with running in the final hour significantly limited. Lap time improvements throughout the field were posted within the opening 30 minutes of running.
The ORECA-built Rebellion Racing R-13s ended up third and fourth. Thomas Laurent lowered the fastest lap time for the #3 entry with his first lap of the session to finish as the quickest non-hybrid and less than one second adrift of the #7 Toyota. The team entered the session in a provisional fifth.
The #1 Rebellion finished fourth, 0.036s clear of the #17 SMP Racing entry. The #10 DragonSpeed failed to improve on its Wednesday benchmark in the BR1 but stayed sixth.
Also failing to improve after clutch issues kept them in the garage, the #11 SMP Racing entry driven by 2009 F1 world champion Jenson Button alongside Vitaly Petrov and Mikael Aleshin will start seventh ahead of the ByKolles Racing #4.
After a troubled start to qualifying, the Manor Ginetta G60s ended up ninth and 14th overall. The #5 car was beaten by four LMP2 entries despite having been ahead before its best time was deleted for a scrutineering issue.
The Idec Sport #48 claimed pole position in the LMP2 category. The team battled for top spot with the #28 TDS Racing squad who had held the provisional pole in class before a scrutineering infringement dropped the team to fourth in LMP2.
With the #31 DragonSpeed and #26 G-Drive entry second and third in class, ORECA-built LMP2 cars locked out the top four positions. The first Ligier was the #23 Panis Barthez Competition entry fifth in LMP2.
GTE-Pro pole position was seized by #91 Porsche entry. Gianmaria Bruni’s stunning 3m47.504s time set on his first qualifying lap on Wednesday remained at the top of the timesheet throughout the three qualifying sessions.
The #91 finished 1.490s ahead of team-mates in the #92 Porsche, with the #66 Chip Ganassi Ford a slender 0.1s further back in third place.
Also carrying a Wednesday benchmark through the qualifying sessions was the Dempsey-Proton Racing #88 team. Matteo Cairoli’s 3m50.728s time was 0.6s clear of the next best to claim GTE-Am class pole.
Second in class was the #86 Gulf Racing entry. Ben Barker recorded an improvement in the opening stages of the session to break up what was a Dempsey-Proton Porsche one-two at the top of GTE-Am.