Sebring 12 Hours 2-3
Peugeot In Trouble

The sick No. 6 was pushed back to its garage while Werner continued to keep pace with Minassian. However, The Audi driver made a mistake and took to the grass at Turn 10. Although he continued, the delay caused him to lose second place, with the Andretti Acura now in that spot and first in LM P2. A few laps later Melo makes nearly the same mistake at about the same spot, but with only a slight loss of the Ferrari’s big margin in GT2.

The No. 6 Porsche rejoined the race after about 15 minutes behind the wall but after a single exploratory lap Patrick Long came back in again. The No. 2 Audi dropped out of the lead lap for the moment as Werner made a scheduled stop to hand over to Lucas Luhr.

The important scheduled stop—that of the overall leader, comes at the 1:26 elapsed time mark. Pedro Lamy is aboard the P1 coupe as four new Michelins are fitted. The No. 1 Audi is handed over to Tom Kristensen and this particular scramble leaves Timo Bernhard momentarily in the overall lead—the first time today for a P2 car. The No. 7 was then handed over to Romain Dumas, who exited the pits too quickly and was brought back in for a penalty. Meanwhile, Andretti appears to be triple-stinting the Acura’s Michelins. He is also the only starting driver still aboard among the leading teams as we approach two hours.

Fastest prototype laps at 1 hour 40 tell a story:
07 Peugeot 45.056
1 Audi 46.302
2 Audi 46.563
26 Acura 47.274
7 Penske Porsche 47.460
15 Acura 48.422
9 Acura 48.786
6 Penske Porsche 49.190
20 Dyson Porsche 49.245
16 Dyson Porsche 49.377
37 Intersport Lola 49.381

Apart from Capello (lap 12) best laps were either very early in the race or after stops at approx. 90 minutes.

Fastest laps in GT2 also tell a story:
62 Risi Ferrari 02.434
45 Lizard Porsche 03.193
46 Lizard Porsche 03.381
73 Tafel Ferrari 03.634
71 Tafel Ferrari 03.642
87 F-Loles Porsche 03.660
44 Lizard Porsche 03.802

Melo stopped at about the 1:45 mark, handing the erstwhile GT2 class leading Ferrari to Mika Salo. Dirk Werner briefly held the class lead (5 minutes) before the Farnbacher Loles Porsche was passed off to Marc Basseng.

Out front Lamy has re-opened the gap, with the smoking Andretti splitting the two Audis. Salo is fastest in GT2 and stretching that class lead. The suffering Lizard has been healed with Richard Lietz re-entering the race some 28 laps behind the GT2 leader.

The Corvette battle seems to have come to a premature end as Olivier Beretta’s No. 4 GT1 entry is pushed behind the wall with a halfshaft problem. The Ford GT has been in the pits for about a half-hour. The car wouldn’t restart following some clutch repairs and the team replaced the starter motor—still no juice.

The two-hour mark passes with race settling considerably as both of the key classes, overall and GT2, having substantial gaps at the front. There is a good battle for 6th overall, 3rd in LM P2, between Adrian Fernandez (No. 15 Acura) and Guy Smith (No. 16 Porsche).

Hour 2 Positions
1 07 P1 1 Pedro Lamy Run 61 0.000 1:45.056 Peugeot 908
2 1 P1 2 Tom Kristensen Run 61 34.285 1:46.302 Audi R10
3 2 P1 3 Lucas Luhr Run 61 59.406 1:46.563 Audi R10
4 26 P2 1 Marco Andretti Run 61 1:08.686 1:47.274 Acura ARX-01B
5 7 P2 2 Romain Dumas Run 60 1 Lap 1:47.460 Porsche RS Spyder
6 15 P2 3 Adrian Fernandez Run 60 14.513 1:48.422 Acura ARX-01B
7 16 P2 4 Guy Smith Run 60 16.190 1:49.377 Porsche RS Spyder
8 9 P2 5 Scott Sharp Run 60 26.873 1:48.786 Acura ARX-01B
9 20 P2 6 Marino Franchitti Run 59 2 Laps 1:49.245 Porsche RS Spyder
10 27 P2 7 Fredy Lienhard Run 59 1:38.652 1:50.316 Porsche RS Spyder
11 3 GT1 1 Johnny O`Connell Run 57 4 Laps 1:57.839 Chevrolet Corvette LS7
12 32 P2 8 J C Ravier Run 57 26.012 1:51.148 Zytek 07S
13 12 P1 4 Tony Burgess Pit 56 5 Laps 1:54.281 Creation Ca07-002 Judd
14 4 GT1 2 Olivier Beretta Pit 55 6 Laps 1:57.591 Chevrolet Corvette LS7
15 008 GT1 3 Terry Borcheller Run 55 2:43.709 2:00.642 Aston Martin DBR 9
16 37 P1 5 Clint Field Run 55 3:16.362 1:49.381 Lola B06/10 AER
17 62 GT2 1 Mika Salo Run 54 7 Laps 2:02.434 Ferrari F430 GT
18 45 GT2 2 Jörg Bergmeister Run 54 29.348 2:03.193 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR
19 87 GT2 3 Marc Basseng Run 54 32.209 2:03.660 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR
20 44 GT2 4 Seth Neiman Run 53 8 Laps 2:03.802 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR
21 5 GT2 5 Nathan Swartzbaugh Run 53 11.264 2:05.687 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR
22 21 GT2 6 Joey Hand Run 53 14.015 2:05.505 Panoz Esperante GTLM
23 73 GT2 7 Pierre Ehret Run 53 56.428 2:03.634 Ferrari F430 GT
24 61 GT2 8 Eric van de Poele Run 52 9 Laps 2:04.587 Ferrari F430 GT
25 007 GT2 9 Tim Sugden Run 51 10 Laps 2:07.366 Aston Martin DBRS 9
26 11 GT2 10 Chris Hall Pit 50 11 Laps 2:07.697 Dodge Viper Competition Co
27 28 GT2 11 Lou Gigliotti Run 50 1:52.547 2:05.105 Chevrolet Corvette C6
28 77 GT2 12 Mauro Casadei Run 49 12 Laps 2:15.951 Porsche 911 GT3 RS
29 40 GT2 13 David Murry Pit 44 17 Laps 2:06.786 Doran Ford GT-R
30 71 GT2 14 Robert Bell Pit 37 24 Laps 2:03.642 Ferrari F430 GT
31 6 P2 9 Sascha Maassen Pit 29 32 Laps 1:49.190 Porsche RS Spyder
32 46 GT2 15 Richard Lietz Run 27 34 Laps 2:03.381 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR
33 8 P2 -- Ben Devlin Exc -- -- ?.??? Lola B07/46 Mazda

After just under one hour of green flag running Lamy made the No. 07’s second stop and remained aboard. The Peugeot did lose the lead to Tom Kristensen, but only for the briefest moment as the No. 1 Audi made its halt the next time around. The enduring Andretti slips past into second while the Peugeot regained the lead.

The weather has turned slightly as a breeze and some scattered clouds have helped dissipate some of the heat. Andretti finally ended his long stint and Christian Fittipaldi took over. Meanwhile, there are problems with another Acura as Adrian Fernandez (No. 15) completed a very slow lap around to the pits.

The No. 45 Porsche of Jörg Bergmeister took over the GT2 lead when Mika Salo handed the Risi Ferrari off to Gianmaria Bruni. However, that flipped around when Bergmeister stopped for Marc Lieb. This left Basseng atop the smaller production class.

The second full-course caution came at about the 2:45-mark when Paul Drayson went off into the tires at Turn 1. He managed to extract the Aston Martin on his own, the nice green bodywork sporting a hole. The car managed to come back around.

During the caution came a very significant stop as Lamy brought the Peugeot in. All the covers were removed and there was lots of snipping of cables and hoses near the differential. This left the Audis 1-2, Allan McNish now in No. 1 (the leader) and Mike Rockenfeller in No. 2.

The work on the Peugeot cost three yellow flag laps and Stephane Sarrazin managed to reenter the fray before the yellow ended. Indeed, he caught up to the back of the field as the pace car pulled off.

From David Legangnneux, here’s a translation of the team radio:
Peugeot's radio live on Motors TV :

As the rear bodywork is removed : "Drop the cover, we must work !"

We can see the HDi engine !!!

"We've found the trouble"

"We bleed"

"We change the beacon"

“Keep the engine warm"

"No confusion between the mechanics"

The green comes out and Lamy slices through the field, neatly but fairly blocked by Fittipaldi. Then we have another incident as Richard Berry goes Very wide and kicks up some dust. A more serious incident comes at Turn 11 as J. C. Ravier goes one way and then the other, nearly getting collected by a Corvette. The Zytek plows off into the wall, very hard sideways, and we have another full-course intermission.

Oliver Gavin : “We’ve had a problem with a half shaft. It’s very strange; that’s never happened here before in testing or otherwise. The car was perfect up to that point.”

Hour 3 Positions
1 1 P1 1 Allan McNish Run 88 0.000 1:46.302 Audi R10 --
2 2 P1 2 Mike Rockenfeller Run 88 0.809 1:46.211 Audi R10 --
3 26 P2 1 Christian Fittipaldi Run 88 57.274 1:47.274 Acura ARX-01B --
4 7 P2 2 Romain Dumas Run 87 1 Lap 1:47.460 Porsche RS Spyder --
5 16 P2 3 Guy Smith Run 87 12.198 1:49.001 Porsche RS Spyder --
6 20 P2 4 Marino Franchitti Run 87 2:06.384 1:48.812 Porsche RS Spyder --
7 15 P2 5 Adrian Fernandez Run 87 2:10.238 1:48.422 Acura ARX-01B --
8 9 P2 6 Scott Sharp Run 86 2 Laps 1:48.786 Acura ARX-01B --
9 07 P1 3 Pedro Lamy Pit 85 3 Laps 1:45.056 Peugeot 908 --
10 27 P2 7 Didier Theys Run 85 13:54.377 1:50.316 Porsche RS Spyder --
11 32 P2 8 J C Ravier Run 84 4 Laps 1:51.148 Zytek 07S --
12 3 GT1 1 Ron Fellows Run 83 5 Laps 1:57.839 Chevrolet Corvette LS7 --
13 008 GT1 2 Chapman Ducote Pit 81 7 Laps 2:00.642 Aston Martin DBR 9 --
14 12 P1 4 Bryan Willman Run 80 8 Laps 1:54.281 Creation Ca07-002 Judd --
15 62 GT2 1 Gianmaria Bruni Pit 80 39.965 2:02.434 Ferrari F430 GT --
16 87 GT2 2 Bryce Miller Run 79 9 Laps 2:03.660 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR --
17 45 GT2 3 Marc Lieb Run 79 8.307 2:03.193 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR --
18 44 GT2 4 Darren Law Run 78 10 Laps 2:03.802 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR --
19 37 P1 5 Richard Berry Run 78 4.121 1:49.381 Lola B06/10 AER --
20 5 GT2 5 Uwe Alzen Run 78 24.116 2:05.687 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR --
21 21 GT2 6 Tom Sutherland Run 77 11 Laps 2:05.505 Panoz Esperante GTLM --
22 73 GT2 7 Jim Tafel Run 77 2:00.797 2:03.634 Ferrari F430 GT --
23 61 GT2 8 Eric van de Poele Run 76 12 Laps 2:04.587 Ferrari F430 GT --
24 11 GT2 9 Joel Feinberg Run 74 14 Laps 2:07.697 Dodge Viper Competition Co --
25 4 GT1 3 Max Papis Run 74 26.696 1:57.591 Chevrolet Corvette LS7 --
26 28 GT2 10 Marc Goossens Run 73 15 Laps 2:05.105 Chevrolet Corvette C6 --
27 77 GT2 11 Mauro Casadei Run 73 1:41.328 2:15.951 Porsche 911 GT3 RS --
28 007 GT2 12 Paul Drayson Pit 70 18 Laps 2:07.103 Aston Martin DBRS 9 --
29 40 GT2 13 Andrea Robertson Run 58 30 Laps 2:06.786 Doran Ford GT-R --
30 46 GT2 14 Patrick Pilet Run 52 36 Laps 2:03.381 Porsche 911 GT3 RSR --
31 71 GT2 15 Dominik Farnbacher Run 45 43 Laps 2:03.642 Ferrari F430 GT --
32 6 P2 9 Sascha Maassen Pit 29 59 Laps 1:49.190 Porsche RS Spyder --
33 8 P2 -- Ben Devlin Exc -- -- ?.??? Lola B07/46 Mazda --
34 48 GT2 -- Johnny Mowlem DNS -- -- ?.??? Ferrari F430 GT --
35 10 P1 -- Ben Collins DNS -- -- ?.??? Radical R10 ECO --

12:44 Lowe’s Accura pit call : “We had a fuel issue, but we had to pit anyway after contact with the Dyson car to replace an end plate.”

12:45 : Drayson Barwell car in the wall at T1.
Tim Sugden : “I’d just handed over to Paul; the car had been running really well. The damage looks fairly superficial but there seems to be a problem with the diff.”

In getting the Aston Martin back to the pits, the gearbox has been further damaged. “We’re going to try to get it back out,” said Chris Needell. “Paul had just taken over, got on the marbles at T1 and went in backwards.”