Le Mans Scrutineering Tuesday 13
Race Favourites Peugeot

With the ‘new’ #7 Peugeot running on the airfield runway last night, reportedly without any issues arising the Peugeot Sport team are as ready as they will now ever be to take the fight for an overall win to the Audi R10s.

Has the Test day incident which destroyed the #7 car though blunted the edge of the French Lion’s attack?

Bruno Famin
“We will ask the drivers to push for first and second and if we see that there is a gap to the other cars then we will be happy with that and not push harder.  There is no way that the drivers will be allowed to battle each other in qualifying.

“The #7 car is complete, and to the full revised specification but the effort has been tiring and of course has hit our spares situation which was already not where we would have liked it to be.”

Mark Gene:
“It was a big hit, I really didn’t think I would walk away from it.  I have some pain in my neck and in my back but I am OK to run, no problem.”

Jacques Villeneuve:
“These big races, and the history, are what’s left to pursue when you stop driving.

“The pace surprised us at the test.  We had tyres to choose and were working through a plan but the overall speed was a surprise.

“The race though is a different matter.  There’s no point in going too fast, the game is to keep going at a speed that we can finish.”

Ricardo Zonta:
“It is no different to when I raced here before 10 years ago (for Mercedes).  The driver has to know the limit without risking the car.

“For Mark (Gene) though it was different, he just had bad luck.”

Stephane Sarrazin:
“I don’t know if the team will let me have a go at matching the 3:22 I made on the test day.

“We do though need to know how good the tyres and the set-up are, and how stable the car is through traffic.

“The lap time at the test came when I was pushing really, really hard, there is not a lot more left to come.”

Alexander Wurz:
“It is not about the overall speed here, more about picking up some of the time we lost at the test which we wanted to use on set-up for the race.

“The task hasn’t changed that radically since I was here last (in 1996 when he won the race in the TWR Porsche WSC95) but the technology has moved on a lot and the limit has moved on too.  These cars are very, very impressive.  The G-force is very close to F1 and I really like the feel of the car.

“The only major disadvantage on the feel compared to a big single seater is the weight.  It took me around 20 laps to get used to that aspect of the car.

“As for the pressure of being favourites.  It wouldn’t be the same without pressure!”