Le Mans Series - Algarve - To The Finish

Leventis pits from third, tyres are bolted on and Leventis rejoins.

Trouble again for the #40 Quifel ASM car, the front left suspension looks awry and the car is garaged.

Lots to report in GT2, Turner is getting ever closer to Lietz for second, 3 seconds the gap at 3 hours 20 minutes.

Vilander meanwhile grabs 4th from Ried, this the battle between the cars previously pedalled by Alesi and Henzler.

For For seventh Dominik Farnbacher goes head to head with Companc, the Hankook shod car putting a magnificent move around the outside to grab the position.

The CRS duo have battled over 9th, Kirkaldy going by Quaife but the #90 car picking up a sheet of artificial grass on the front end.

Drama for the fourth placed overall, LMP2 leading Strakka HPD, Nick Leventis grids to a halt on the run out of Turn 5.  The car is towed to a place of safety but Nicolet is through into the lead of the class and 4th overall.  The HPD is a retirement.

Erdos is pushing hard to close a near 2 lap gap to the #24 car, Ebbesvik is now up to third in class.

Jody Firth is up to sixth overall in the FLM leading #44 Oreca.

GT2 is still a marvellous race up and down the order.

Leader pits, Sarrazin out, Lapierre in, 3 hours and 40 minutes elapsed.

Mailleux is now aboard the #008 Lola Aston Martin and down into the 1:33s.

Warren Hughes is back aboard the #44 DAMS car and now chasing Gary Chalandon in the #43 car, Chalandon though owes us a stop, Thor Christian Ebbesvik is trying to take both – He eventually does so and Hughes follows up by taking the lead again in FLM and seventh place overall.

Lieb and Dumbreck are duelling for fourth in GT2 – that becomes a battle for third as Ried pits in the #88 car, Ragginger climbs aboard.

Lieb finally gets by the Spyker, Dumbreck one of several that owes us a stop, the Spyker eventually does stop and Bell is up to 4th.

Bruni leads Lieb by a minute.

Ebbesvik is up to an amazing second in LMP2, 6th overall.

215 laps is the magic number.

Russo is catching Simonsen for 7th.

The #66 Atlas Saleen spins out and smacks the barrier with 75 minutes remaining, the car pits with a sizeable chunk of left rear bodywork missing – It rejoins (for a while at least).

Lieb pits in #77, Lietz rejoins without drama.

The #24 Oak Pesca rejoins after a lengthy gearbox repair.

49 minutes remaining and 24 laps required. The top 6 are in cruise home mode but GT2 is still all business.

Lietz is now ahead of Vilander with the pit stops equalised, #77s earlier out of sequence stop forced on them by debris in the wheel arches.

Russo is now by the Spyker and up into 4th, all three AF Corse Ferraris in the top 4.

Vilander puts in the fastest lap of the #95 cars race in pursuit of Lietz.

Russo, Bleekemolen and Simonsen, Turner leaps back up the order to fourth.

Franck Mailleux spins under braking into Turn 5, is pushed to a place of safety, refires the car and rejoins, still third.

Vilander is going faster and faster – 4 seconds back now from the #77 car.

7 laps to go and Vilander gets by Lietz under braking into Turn One and its game on, Lietz having a look as Vilander seems to be struggling on tyres.

The leader pits for a splash of diesel – 6 laps remaining.

Vilander gets a slight edge and we’re wondering now whether Lietz can do it on fuel? his pace suggests that he can.

And so does the final result - close but not close enough for #77 to get the place back - GT2 is an AF Corse 1,2 - #96 from #95 at the flag with the #77 car coming home third (on a 30 hour old engine) and JMW a magnificent 4th in the #92 Aston.

Spare a thought though for the Spyker boys who suffered a late race power steering failure, which sent them plummeting down the order.

Rebellion will be delighted with second, and with bringing both Lolas home, albeit tinged with irritation that the #13 car was delayed by a slower car's carelessness.

Signature Plus have reason to be proud of their efforts too, all three drivers drove very well indeed, a well deserved podium finish their reward.

In LMP2 RML's efforts are rewarded at last, their first overall class win since their overall third place finish at Spa in 2007! Well done to all concerned.  Ben Collins drove a controlled race on his debut for the team in sportscars but this one really is for those that have worked so hard week in, week out to bring one home on the top step.

It's been a magnificent recovery run from Bruichladdich, with a particular plaudit to Thor Christian Ebbesvik coming back from painful injury. 

To cap off what has been a fascinating race Lapierre beats Oreca's own race lap record here by a single thousandth of a second, 1:32.375 and Gimmi Bruni caps a fine race win for the #96 crew by posting their fastest lap on the final circuit- 1:44.849.

Pegasus Racing get the perhaps unexpected double bonus of coming home a distant third in LMP2 and winning the mysterious Michelin Green X Challenge - Plenty of trophies then as just reward for making the trip after a very trying few weeks.

In Formula Le Mans well done to DAMS, and in particular to Jody Firth and Warren Hughes, coming through the early race attrition and rising above the limitations of the machinery to make something difficult look remarkably easy.  That DAMS brought home their pair of cars 1,2 shows that quality counts.

Larbre triumphed in the clash of the old titans - More silverware - Ho hum!

But GT2 was the real highlight as a racing spectacle - Barely a moment passed in just under six hours when we didn't have close racing to enjoy, and every single one of the dozen class runners was involved at some point or other (or several!) More of the same in Hungary please boys!

Finally - Apologies for the limited service of updates - Annoyingly whilst trying to solve what looked like an insurmountable technical issue it appears that the issue was a false failure message!  We'll catch up with some of the missing pieces in the coming days.