Le Mans 24 Hours – Thursday Morning

Kruse-Schiller, Pescarolo And Team Modena Updates

Three cars ended the Wednesday Qualifying sessions with substantial issues to be resolved, happily all three look set to be back in action this week, two of them indeed should be back for tonight’s qualifying sessions.

The Team Modena Aston martin suffered a major oil leak after the shaft driving the external oil pump sheared, snapping an oil line on the scavenge end of the system.

That meant no oil pressure alarms and a substantial delay before Terry Borcheller realised there was an issue, only indeed when the spill ended up on the #59 DBR9’s rear tyres.  The damage to the Aston is relatively light but unfortunately the #16 Pescarolo, first on the scene of the slick laid down by the Aston, wasn’t so lucky, Romain Dumas hitting the wall at the Porsche curves very hard indeed causing substantial damage front and rear (particularly the front right hand corner).

Romain’s sprint back along the track after the session was red flagged was enough to confirm that he was OK but the Pescarolo Sport team were grim faced when the car finally returned.

Happily though Henri Pescarolo confirmed to dsc this morning that the tub was undamaged and the car is now being reassembled in time for tonight’s action.

The final incident of the night involved Hideki Noda and a very violent barrel roll aboard the #44 Kruse-Schiller Motorsport Lola – Mazda.

Noda got the car out of shape on the run up to the Dunlop Bridge the gar getting sideway and briefly airborne before tumbling through an eight roll accident that comprehensively demolished the car.

Noda was happily able to leave the car unaided and appears almost unhurt.

The car was assessed overnight by Lola and the initial verdict is that whilst the repair required is a substantial one, the work can be done here at the track, including a repair to a small hole in the tub.  A large number of parts though will need to be flown in to assist the rebuild, the second that this car has required so far this year, the car having already had a substantial accident in the Spa 1000kms. 

A very tired looking Kai Kruse told dsc this morning that his crew would be working very hard indeed to get the car rebuilt before Saturday Morning’s warm-up session.  We wish them well ahead of what looks to be an epic struggle to get the car to the start of the race.