Le Mans 24h 2016

jack_christie

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2016 Changes & Improvements To The Le Mans Circuit Detailed
http://www.dailysportscar.com/2016/...ovements-to-the-le-mans-circuit-detailed.html

Le Mans Test Day Entry List
http://www.dailysportscar.com/2016/06/02/le-mans-test-day-entry-list-2.html

All You Need To Know About The Le Mans Test Day
http://www.dailysportscar.com/2016/06/02/all-you-need-to-know-about-the-le-mans-test-day.html

Spotter guide, not up, but Andy said he working on it
http://www.spotterguides.com

  • Test Day June 5th
  • scrutineering 12-13 June
  • official practice 15-16
  • race 18-19 June

CkDS9FiWYAENNEq.jpg:large


#lemans24
https://twitter.com/hashtag/lemans24?f=tweets&vertical=default&src=hash

Timing
http://www.fiawec.com/live-en.html
 
 
Porsche qualified first and second for LMP1, then 2 Toyotas followed by 2 Audis. Ford is in first, second, fourth and fifth for GT PRO. Going to be one helluva race this year.

Looks like Fox picked it up to broadcast in the US on FS1 and FS2! So I'll be able to actually watch the race this year! Go Audi! Go Ford!
 
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Le Mans GTE Pro teams risk in-race penalties for manipulation

The organisers of the Le Mans 24 Hours have not ruled out awarding in-race penalties to any GTE Pro teams suspected of manipulating their Balance of Performance in the run-up to the race.

The pace of the new Ford GT and Ferrari 488 GTE cars in Thursday night qualifying raised many eyebrows in the paddock, further intensifying the BoP debate that has been a bone of contention in the class for most of the 2016 season.

Ford and Ferrari locked out the top seven positions in GTE Pro, with Ford?s fastest car, the #68 of Dirk Muller, lapping the Circuit de la Sarthe 4.815s faster than its quickest test day time two weeks prior.

The #51 Ferrari 488 GTE, driven by Gianmaria Bruni, was 4.3s faster in qualifying than it had been during the test at the beginning of the month.

?We are looking very attentively at the performances that we analyse, and we have good tools to it, FIA technical director Bernard Niclot told Motorsport.com.

?We will probably ask some questions again to the manufacturers and then we will decide the final BoP tomorrow [Friday]. We have some questions to analyse and my team are doing that today.?

?If someone has hidden performance, then we have the possibility to issue a penalty during the race and this will be discussed tomorrow and how we will apply it.

?We can apply a big penalty if we realise that a car has completely hidden the performance.?

Niclot went on to state that the Ford GT and Ferrari 488 GTE, both of which are built to new 2016 regulations, could be inherently quicker than their direct opposition. But he also acknowledged that some aspects of performance cannot be studied effectively and included in the BoP.

?Remember that in GTE we have new regulations this year,? added Niclot. ?We are happy with these regulations because we can develop some very beautiful cars, but today we only have two cars that are built to the new regulations.

"These are new cars and all of the performance parameters cannot be addressed by BoP. There are a lot of things like the stability of the car, the braking ability and so on.

"These are not addressed in the BoP. So, some things are impossible to simulate or calculate.?

Tandy ?not surprised? by sandbagging

Among the manufacturers that have suffered following the dramatic increase of pace by the Ford and Ferrari entries is Porsche, which has entered a pair of factory 911 RSRs in the GTE Pro division.

Nick Tandy, who pilots the #91 car, told Motorsport.com that he has no doubts that some of his opposition operated in a different manner at the test day two weeks ago.

?It?s not unexpected [what Ford did],? said the defending overall Le Mans winner.

?From our point of view, we used the test day to find out how the car was working. Some other teams clearly didn?t, but that?s up to them.

"We hit the performance levels we expected, we?re faster than we?ve ever been round here."

Tandy described how his car has "no chance" of getting close to the 3m51s laps that Ford and Ferrari were able to achieve on Thursday.

?Based on the times of the test day, you can understand [the recent BoP changes]," continued the Briton. "But it should be obvious lap times on a single day don?t show you everything about a certain car.

?It's not hard to work out that, based on the lap times we could do last year and the available performance upgrades we have this year, as well as the weight we are required to run, we have no chance of running at 3m51s.?

Porsche's pace "quickest ever"

The fastest Porsche in qualifying yesterday was the #92, which in the hands of Frederic Makowiecki was the fastest car other than Ford and Ferrari but 3.733s off the ultimate pace.

?We?re happy with the pace of the car, and that we?ve done a good job," said Tandy. "3m54s is the fastest qualifying lap we?ve ever done, and it?s more or less what we simulated in the factory.

?I understand it?s possible in the regulations that it can be changed at any point. It?s up to the organisers ? but I don?t think anything is going to happen.

"That?s the way the calculation has been made, and the pace of the respective cars is known for this circuit.?

http://www.motorsport.com/lemans/ne...n-race-penalties-for-manipulation-788803/?s=1

Fighting talk from Ford on sandbagging allegations

The Ford GT squad has vehemently denied allegations of hiding performance in the run-up to the Le Mans 24 Hours following the American brand's spectacular first qualifying showing on Wednesday evening.

Larry Holt, the Vice-President of Multimatic - the company which was instrumental in bringing the Blue Oval back to top-level endurance racing, and which was a cornerstone in designing and building the new car - declared that Ford?s competitors were "whining and moaning."

?What you saw last night was absolute getting a bunch of guys, two major OEMs in a Ford/Ferrari battle," said Holt. "That?s what everybody wants to see:Ferrari and Ford hammering it out.

"And all these other guys, like Corvette, who got hit with a BoP [penalty], there?s no way they are as slow as they showed last night. That?s complete bullshit.?

According to Holt, the Ford GT, which was as much as five seconds faster in qualifying than during the test day, went quicker than expected due to a combination of circumstances.

?We took every advantage, obviously, like low fuel," said Holt. ?We knew we were going to go faster. We know where the car should be, but we hadn?t realised that lap time for a whole bunch of different reasons.?

Holt went on to state that the majority of running before qualifying had concentrated on reliability, and not performance work.

?There was a lot of maintenance-type work, correlating our fuel consumption, tyre wear, brake pad wear and so on through the test," he continued. "We were just running a lot of laps, making sure that we could do the required 14 [laps] on fuel."

?All that sort of thing was going on at the test, observed by the FIA. So, we did some fast laps,but nothing spectacular and ended up with a 3m56s knowing full well that the car should be capable, on race pace, of probably mid-3m54s, which is our target race pace time.?

Holt claims that several stars became aligned on Wednesday for at least some of the Ford GTs to go for an all-out fast lap, a decision sanctioned by Ford chiefs Raj Nair and Dave Pericak.

?It became a big qualifying battle last night,? said Holt. ?Then Ferrari stepped it up and all of a sudden we were strapping on slicks and running low [fuel] tanks and putting in the fast guys.

"I had to ask, Raj Nair and Dave Pericak: ?What do you want to do?? They said: ?OK, go?. So we went!?

Did atmospheric pressure aid turbo times?

Holt also maintains that the atmospheric pressure contributed to the spectacular lap times in Q1.

?They [the ACO] declare an atmospheric barometric pressure that we run to on the turbo cars,? he explained.

?Last night the actual barometric pressure was significantly less than [usual], I think they declared 1019 millibar for what they think it is going to be over the weekend, and last night it was actually something like 950.

"So we probably had eight or 10 horsepower due to what they were declaring as atmospheric pressure, and what atmospheric pressure really was last night. That?s an advantage you sometimes get from a turbo.

"Add all those things together, and you saw the outcome: 1, 2, 4, 5.?

Suggesting that there was not much more pace that could be squeezed out of the Ford GT, Holt admitted that there is an expectation the car will be pegged back by the ACO and the FIA.

"I don?t expect to be left alone now because of the how BoP works," he conceded. ?I?m waiting for a lightning bolt to hit me in the head. We were four tenths up on the Ferrari.

"I would think they will probably do something to pull us back about half a second. So I would say you probably saw the most out of the car in qualifying."

"We did not hide performance"

Holt was direct in his answer about possible sandbagging before qualifying, saying: ?Did we hide anything before last night? No, we never hid any performance per se.

"There?s nothing sneaky under the table. But we never went out to set a qualifying lap time.

?Where did the Ferrari time came from? They were three seconds quicker too. You do that in qualifying. That was an absolutely balls-out qualifying lap.

"I think there?s probably over a second in the atmospheric table and a little bit [extra] just because we got carried away. I mean, Dirk [Muller] put one in right on the last lap. He got a tow, saw 301kph [on the Mulsanne straight].

Holt was quick to express the notion that the aerodynamic advantage of the Ford GT was also a significant part of its blistering speed in qualifying, and that Ferrari has more power at its disposal.

?They [ACO/FIA] watch you all the time and they never said: ?Oh, you guys are sandbagging?. I mean they look at the data," said Holt. "We?re very fast, if you look at our top speeds, trap speeds.

"But if you look at the car, it?s very small. It?s got a frontal area way less than the competitors. But we?re down on power. It?s significantly less.

"The BoP power curve, the power/boost table, is providing much less power to us than Ferrari."

Corvette pace ?nonsense?

The remaining manufacturers in GTE Pro - Porsche, Aston Martin and Corvette - were all significantly slower than Ford and Ferrari, which between them locked out the top seven positions in class.

But Holt said he was convinced that Corvette, whose cars ended up at the bottom of the times, performed their own sandbagging exercise in order to be given a performance break for the race.

?There is no way that the Corvette is that slow, no way,? opined Holt. ?They got a bad BoP break but there is no way that their pace is the pace they showed last night.

"The pace we showed last night, that?s our pace. The pace Ferrari showed last night, that?s their pace. Will we get some BoP [penalty] to even that out? Maybe we will.

"But the other guys, the guys that are whining about it, and moaning and hiding their performance, I have no time for them.?

?If they want to have this classic Ferrari/Ford battle that they keep talking about, last night we showed them a little bit of that action. It?s an entertainment thing, right?

"And in the end I?m not going to bitch if the ACO/FIA gives them a balance of performance advantage to catch us up. But I don?t believe they are all as slow as they?re showing. That?s nonsense.?

Any final changes in the LMGTE Pro BoP would be confirmed on Friday ahead of the race on the Saturday.

http://www.motorsport.com/lemans/news/fighting-talk-from-ford-on-sandbagging-allegations-788902/?s=1
 
Meanwhile, on the track

 
anyone else who thinks it sucks they limited the LMP2 chassis options to just 4, and only a one, measily, single engine??
right now nissan powers about 2/3 of all LMP2's, and next year they'll be faced out completely?

thanks to LMP2 alive, but now get lost!!! or what is the ACO's thinking?
 
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Today's Blipshift shift. I may just need to get it

aEniPZT.png
 
anyone else who thinks it sucks they limited the LMP2 chassis options to just 4, and only a one, measily, single engine??
right now nissan powers about 2/3 of all LMP2's, and next year they'll be faced out completely?

thanks to LMP2 alive, but now get lost!!! or what is the ACO's thinking?

LMP2 is massive this year, although you're somewhat right. Let's see how far it will go when the new rules come.

Also, that SC car drift - rumors said Yannick Dalmas (who appeared to be the driver) did it on purpose :D
 
ACO makes last-minute BoP changes for Le Mans

The ACO and the FIA have made several changes to the contentious Balance of Performance in the LMGTE Pro class for this weekend?s Le Mans 24 Hours.

After a meeting attended by the ACO, the FIA and members of the manufacturers in LMGTE Pro ? Ford, Ferrari, Porsche, Corvette and Aston Martin - several adjustments have been made to the various competitors.

Most significantly, the Ferrari 488 GTE has had 25kg added to its base weight, meaning that it will run at 1268kg for the race this weekend - this equating to a 15kg increase in the latest raft of changes.

The Ford GT has had a 5kg increase to its base weight and will thus run at 1248kgs, which is an additional 10kg compared to what it ran in qualifying.

Ford had previously been given a total of a 25kg weight break between Spa and Le Mans qualifying.

Other changes

As well as adjusting the weight of the cars, the governing bodies have also tweaked the engine restrictor diameter, with Aston Martin and Corvette getting reductions of 0.4mm and 0.3mm respectively.

The boost levels have also been adjusted, with Ford having its boost ratio decreased. Finally, the fuel volume has been modified, Porsche getting an increase of 8 litres, Ferrari - 4 litres and Corvette - 7 litres.

The last minute changes come after controversy surrounded the discrepancy in pace between the turbo- and the normally aspirated cars after qualifying one on Wednesday evening.

Ford and Ferrari were significantly quicker than their direct opposition, but the pace was rationalised by Multimatic?s Larry Holt, who strongly denied accusations of manipulating the pace of the Fords.

No in-race penalties, which are available to the ACO/FIA, were announced for any misleading of the rulemakers during the pre-race process of evaluating the pace of the various LMGTE Pro cars.

http://www.motorsport.com/lemans/news/aco-makes-last-minute-bop-changes-for-le-mans-789072/?s=1
 
This is such a farce lol, Ford and Ferrari hiding their real pace so race control slows them down manually. They'll still win by a big margin if they run an OK race and nothing more. Other cars can run a perfect race and still lose convincingly. And we all know how rare truly perfect races are in 24H.
 
We're closing in on the start of the race and I'm very conflicted. I want my boys in the loud yellow cars to win GTEPro, but it would be amazing to see a Ford win, or better yet, sweep the podium.


Edit: And just like that, one of the Ford GT's is in the garage with engine issues, missing the start. :lol:
 
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I'm amazed at the quadruple amputee guy driving the #84 Morgan LMP2 :-o

PS: (Equipped with an ejector seat, believe it or not)
 
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Watching this, I've checked up on the hybrid technology employed in the LMP1 cars...
Whatever is happening in there is utterly mindboggling... for example Audi has a 2 MJ battery (at 6 MJ allowed recuperation per lap) that is capable of powering 300 kW of electric engine and being charged at possibly a similar rate :eek: That also means over the roughly 400 laps they do, this battery goes through some 1200 charging cycles. In a timespan of 24 hours. How is that even possible? I simply don't get how this is even possible - utterly ridiculous amounts of power delivered at a very very high reliability and with immense cycles. I am completely baffled.

Also: that onboard sound on the 919 - damn! Like a swarm of very angry mechanical bees!
 
I still don't understand all this BoP shit. There should be a set of rules that set a basic framework of a car with numbers. Maximum power, minumum weight, maximum fuel capacity, maximum boost, etc. let the manufacturers decide their own strategy as long as their cars fit within the rules. If one company want bigger fuel tanks, while another company thinks they can do better with less fuel weight on board. Fine. But to arbitrarity add weight or restrict airflow here and there seems stupid as hell.
 
I'm really bummed out that the Corvettes are no where in all this. I guess all those people claiming they were sandbagging in quali were full of shit.
 
I do feel for the Corvettes and Astons who are really nowhere to be seen in this race, but this is still one hell of a cracker. 1st to 3rd seperated by 20 sec, 2nd and 3rd head to head for hours now. GT Pro had a Ferrari way upfront but the sheer pace on the Fords means they really are hunting them down (6 sec between em right now). LMP2 and GT Am are the calmer categories but even there the gaps are under a lap so every little mistake costs you the win.
 
WTF? 6 minutes before the end the Toyota #5 which was in first place lost power on the Mulsanne straight and limped back to the start-finish-line but didn't pull into the pits. Now they're stopped at the finish line and Kazuki Nakajima restartet the car. Porsche #2 took the advantage and rushed into the lead after they changed tires 10 minutes before the end.

[edit]
So, Porsche won with the 919 #2, Toyota #5 ist still limping around the course to complete the last lap since Nakajima stopped after the start-finish-line.

Now that's unfortunate, Toyota did a great job and would have deserved that win.
[/edit]
 
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Not even classified. Looks in the statistics like they never played a role. What a shame, so sad for them.
 
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