Le Mans 24 Hours – Thursday Qualifying Session 1
19:00 – 21:00

We’ve had a brief shower here at Le Mans for 15 minutes or so which no doubt made life rather interesting for the Group C cars out on track for their qualifying session ahead of Saturday’s Le mans Legends race – more of that tomorrow.

As for track action tonight – It’s unlikely that we’ll see any Peugeot heroics, despite Frank Montagny’s assertion that a 3:16 is possible in the 908.

We will though surely see an attempt to move up the order form the so far underperforming #10 Charouz Lola Aston Martin, a car built for this circuit if ever there was one.

Perhaps the best battle might be in GT1, Oliver Gavin’s attempt to better Jan Magnussen was thwarted by a puncture and Christophe Bouchut was similarly left wondering what might have been after a gear selector failure in the #50 Larbre Saleen meant that his challenge couldn’t be fully driven home.

And that’s before we consider the factory Aston Martin DBR9s.  Surely the team won’t be content with fifth and sixth in class?

GT2 looks set to see Virgo motorsport try to grab the class pole for Ferrari and Dunlop – Rob Bell will be let loose if conditions allow.  The Porsche needle match though looks over, Pat Long tells dsc they are unlikely to go for it this evening “Unless a bunch of Ferraris rain on our parade!”

With the track now almost fully dry the cars emerge for the first of the two two hour qualifying sessions – But there’s an almost immediate problem for Laurent Groppi aboard the #5 Courage Oreca – The car is into the barriers a little way on from the exit of the second Mulsanne Chicane, some front end damage and a rather bent section of armco but Groppi OK – Red flag.

The repair crew are on site, the #5 car is being recovered

The session restarts at 19:30 after a 23 or 24 minute interruption.

First to show an improvement from yesterday is...........The Lola Aston Martin, a 3:33.144 bringing the car up to 13th (from 15th)

The refettled team Modena Aston martin improves its time but not position as the Lola Aston Martin looks to be going quicker again - it does, a 3:29.273 for Mucke, up to eighth.

Another refettled car, the #16 Pescarolo, back on track after the car hit oil, and then the wall in the Porsche curves at 249 kph, pits for a check over.

The Speedy Sebah Lola is in the gravel as Marco Werner improves his time in the #1 Audi.

Ben Aucott has a big rear impact in the #99 JMB Ferrari at the Dunlop Chicane - there'll be no further action from that car tonight after the rear end takes a substantial biff from the tyre barrier, engine cover, rear wing and rear bodywork substantially altered.

Thomas Erdos improves the RML MG Lolas time, up to sixth in class, a 3:40.4

Sarrazin is down to a 3:20 in the #8 Peugeot, Klien in the #9 car a 3:24

Peter Hardman in their Vitaphone Aston Martin and Mike Lewis in the Autocon Creation both post improved times, Lewis continues to improve and begins to edge up through the LMP2 ranks.

The van Mersteijn Motorsport squad have made it clear that if the weather holds (and it looks like it will!) Jos Verstappen will be given a couple of opportunities to attack the class pole position.

More improvements to report as the session passes the half way point - Nakano improves a little in the newly accepted #21 Epsilon and Thomas Erdos closes to within a tenth of a second of the fifth in LMP2 Embassy Racing WF01.

Jacques Nicolet (#4 Pescarolo) and Nic Jonsson (#83 Ferrari) post small improvements, the #78 BMS Ferrari too shows an improved time.

The Aston Martin march to the front begins! - Darren Turner up to fourth in GT1 ahead of the #55 Lamborghini with a 3:51.859.

Policand (#72 Corvette) and Nicolet (#4 Pescarolo) improve, 40 minutes to go in the session.

McNish improves with a 3:23.847, fastest of the Audis but still 3 seconds astray of the #7 Peugeot.

The Newbie Euskadi has been running quit well this evening. Its position now is a match for its car number—21. Not bad for a car that was essentially in pieces back in Spain 48 hours ago. The chance for much improvement for others ends when Ricardo Zonta firmly plants the No. 9 Peugeot into the tire wall at the Porsche Curves. It is the first chink in the armor of the French army.

Ricardo Zonta bumped into Martin Little (dsc's 2008 Le Mans pit reporter) and said "The red Japanese car hit me in the right rear and i went straight on into the barrier.  I'm fine but as for the car............."

That problem was cleared up quickly but then we had a quite serious accident as Stuart Hall slammed the front of the No. 14 Creation into the barrier at the Esses. It snapped around and arts of the rear body were also shed. Hall was helped from the car and appeared a bit wobbly as he was led away by a careful marshal. No word on whether we will have a re-creation.

A bit earlier Jos Menten suffered a wheel failure going down the long straight. He slowed the No. 59 Aston Martin to a crawl, but even that slow pace was too quick as the wheel parted company just as he rounded Mulsanne Corner.

Indeed, that is the entire history of the period as with 15 clock minutes remaining in the session the official word arrives that the session will not be restarted before the scheduled 22:00 end. Instead the 15 lost minutes will be added on 45-minutes later, giving the final qualifying period a slightly earlier start.