2010 24 Hours of Le Mans

The 78th 24 Hours of Le Mans (French: ''78^e 24 Heures du Mans'') was a non-championship 24-hour automobile endurance race for Le Mans Prototype (LMP) and Grand Touring (GT) cars held from 12 to 13 June 2010 at the Circuit de la Sarthe, near Le Mans, France, before 238,150 spectators. It was the 78th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans as organised by the automotive group, the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO).

A Peugeot 908 HDi FAP shared by Sébastien Bourdais, Pedro Lamy and Simon Pagenaud started from pole position after Bourdais set the fastest overall qualifying lap in the first qualifying session. The team led the opening two hours until a suspension mounting fault in the third hour forced their retirement and giving the lead to the sister Peugeot squad of Anthony Davidson, Marc Gené and Alexander Wurz until they had to enter the garage to replace a failed alternator. Peugeot's third trio of Nicolas Minassian, Franck Montagny and Stéphane Sarrazin took the lead and maintained it for 144 consecutive laps before the engine failed due to connecting rod failure, handing the lead to an Audi R15 TDI plus driven by the Audi Sport North America team of Timo Bernhard, Romain Dumas and Mike Rockenfeller that they held to the finish. It was Bernhard, Dumas and Rockenfeller's maiden Le Mans victory and Audi's ninth since its first in . The Audi Sport Team Joest trio of Marcel Fässler, André Lotterer and Benoît Tréluyer finished one lap behind in second and their teammates Rinaldo Capello, Tom Kristensen and Allan McNish completed the race podium another two laps adrift in third, giving Audi a sweep of the overall podium positions.

Strakka Racing's HPD ARX-01C car of Jonny Kane, Nick Leventis and Danny Watts won the Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) category after it led the final 267 laps. They were six laps ahead of the second-placed trio of Jan Charouz, Matthieu Lahaye and Guillaume Moreau who drove OAK Racing's Pescarolo 01- Judd. Larbre Compétition won the Le Mans Grand Touring 1 (LMGT1) class with Roland Berville, Julien Canal and Gabriele Gardel in a Saleen S7-R securing the squad's fifth Le Mans category victory. David Hart, Stéphan Grégoire, Jérôme Policand sharing the Luc Alphand Aventures Chevrolet Corvette C6.R and the Young Driver AMR team of Tomáš Enge, Peter Kox and Christoffer Nygaard in an Aston Martin DBR9 completed the class podium and order. A Team Felbermayr-Proton Porsche 997 GT3-RSR won the Le Mans Grand Touring 2 (LMGT2) category with drivers Wolf Henzler, Marc Lieb and Richard Lietz. Team Farnbacher's Ferrari F430 GT2 shared by Dominik Farnbacher, Leh Keen and Allan Simonsen were two laps adrift in second and the class podium was completed by BMS Scuderia Italia's trio of Marco Holzer, Timo Scheider and Richard Westbrook in a Porsche 997 GT3-RSR.

Background and regulation changes

The 2010 24 Hours of Le Mans was the 78th edition of the event and took place on the Circuit de la Sarthe road racing track close to Le Mans, France from 12 to 13 June. The race was first held in 1923 after the automotive journalist Charles Faroux, the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) general secretary Georges Durand and the industrialist Emile Coquile agreed to hold a test of vehicle reliability and durability. The 24 Hours of Le Mans is considered the world's most prestigious sports car races and is part of the Triple Crown of Motorsport.

A series of rule changes for the race were accepted by the ACO in 2009. It accepted cars eligible for the FIA GT1 World Championship to compete in the race provided that they were entered for any one of the ACO-administered championships in the American Le Mans Series (ALMS), Le Mans Series (LMS) or the Asian Le Mans Series (ASLMS). There would now be three safety cars deployed to slow the race in the event of an incident rather than two as observed in LMS rounds and illuminated number panels were mandated for night conditions. Pit stop times were extended because of new tyre switching regulations designed to not provide open-cockpit vehicles with an advantage.

The ACO published a revised set of technical regulations in August 2009 adjusting the performance of diesel-powered and petrol-powered cars to try and create parity. The sizes of the diesel restrictors, restrictor advantages and petrol restrictors were decreased while the petrol restrictors and Aston Martin Le Mans Grand Touring 1 (LMGT1) engine restrictors in Le Mans Prototype 1 (LMP1) cars were enlarged. LMP1 diesel engine vehicles had their minimum weight ballast raised by to relative to petrol-powered cars. No other class had their minimum weights adjusted.

Entries

The ACO Selection Committee received 84 entry requests between the entry phase from the 21 December 2009 opening to the 20 January 2010 deadline with priority given to manufacturer and full-time teams in one or more Le Mans-based championships such as the 2009 LMS, the 2009 ALMS and the 2009 ASLMS. It initially planned to grant 55 entries divided between the LMP1, Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2), LMGT1 and Le Mans Grand Touring 2 (LMGT2) categories, but the ACO thought of increasing the pit lane capacity to 56 cars with the intention of enabling teams to enter "a specific and innovative project" in future years and thus took steps to ensure the additional pit was operational on 4 June.

Automatic entries

Automatic entries were earned by teams which won their class in the 2009 24 Hours of Le Mans and by those that achieved championship victory in other Le Mans-based series and events such as the LMS, the ALMS, the ASLMS, the FIA GT Championship and the Petit Le Mans. Some championship second-placed finishers were also granted automatic invitations in certain series. An entry was also granted to the LMS Green X Challenge, which was an award based on car fuel economy during each LMS event over the course of the season. As entries were pre-selected to teams, they were restricted to a maximum of two cars and were not allowed to change their vehicles or category from the previous year to the next or their automatic invitation would be invalidated. The ACO required automatic entries to confirm that they had taken up their berths prior to 11 January 2010.

On 19 November 2009, the ACO published its final list of automatic entries featuring 29 teams. Corvette Racing, Lowe's Fernández Racing, Patrón Highcroft Racing and Speedy Racing Team Sebah and Vitaphone Racing Team rejected their automatic entries.

Entry list and reserves

The ACO announced the full 55-car list for Le Mans plus ten reserves during its yearly press conference that was broadcast live on the internet on the afternoon of 4 February 2010. The ACO required each entry to confirm a nominated unreplaceable driver apart from ''force majeure'' cases sent to the Sports Committee. Any withdrawn team post 1 February 2010 would be replaced by a reserve entry by category with a GT car replacing another GT vehicle and the same procedure applied to LMP entries. The naming of the other two drivers was optional but recommended up to the 12 May 2010 following the 2010 1000 km of Spa.

On 5 April 2010, Dome withdrew its Dome- Judd S102 LMP1 coupe after the partnership between it and French partner OAK Racing concluded, possibly over budget issues. The first withdrawal promoted the LMP2-category Pegasus Racing Norma MP200P-Judd car to the race. Yoshimisa Hayashi asked the ACO to remove the Tokai University Courage-YGK vehicle from the reserve entries list two days later to allow the university to focus on the following year and to construct a hybrid powertrain. In May, Modena Racing Group (MRG) did not confirm to the ACO their race entry with a Ferrari F430 GT2 before the entry deadline. Team Felbermayr-Proton thus had a second Porsche 911 GT3 RSR promoted to the race in lieu of MRG.

That same month, PK Carsport withdrew its Chevrolet Corvette C6.R due to the car catching fire at the FIA GT1 World Championship meeting at Silverstone Circuit stopping the team from having adequate preparation and resources for Le Mans. AF Corse had a second Ferrari F430 GT2 added to the event as a result of PK's withdrawal. The financially struggling Pescarolo Sport and Sora Racing withdrew their Pescarolo-Judd entries and the KSM Lola B07/40-Judd car and Matech Competition's second Ford GT1 following failed negotiations for the investment firm Genii Capital to purchase Pescarolo, marking Pescarolo's first Le Mans non-entry since . In June, the ACO announced that the first reserve Race Performance Radical SR9-Judd car would get the 56th entry in order to keep a LMP and GT entry balance.

Practice

A single, four-hour free practice session on 9 June was available to all teams. Peugeot led from the start and the fastest lap was a 3 minutes, 20.034 seconds set by the 2 Peugeot 908 HDi FAP of Franck Montagny. His teammate Sébastien Bourdais' No. 3 Peugeot was second-quickest and Loïc Duval came third in the No. 4 Team Oreca Matmut Peugeot. Marc Gené was the slowest Peugeot factory driver in fourth in the No. 1 car and the fastest Audi was the No. 7 Audi R15 TDI plus of Allan McNish in fifth. Aston Martin Racing's No. 009 Lola-Aston Martin B09/60 of Darren Turner was the fastest petrol-powered LMP1 entry in eighth. David Brabham was the quickest LMP2 driver with a 3 minutes, 38.691 seconds lap in the No. 26 Highcroft Racing HPD ARX-01C entry even though the car had a fuel system problem.
Jonny Kane's No. 42 Strakka Racing-entered HPD ARX.01 and Thomas Erdos' No. 25 RML Lola B08/80- HPD cars were second and third in category. Young Driver AMR's No. 52 Aston Martin DBR9 of Tomáš Enge led in LMGT1 from Stéphan Grégoire's No. 72 Luc Alphand Aventures (LAA) Corvette. Olivier Beretta's No. 64 Corvette led LMGT2 and was third amongst all LMGT entries, ahead of Marc Lieb's second-placed Team Felbermayr-Proton No. 77 Porsche 997 GT3 RSR. Romain Grosjean lost control of Matech Competition's No. 60 Ford GT entering the Porsche Curves, striking the Armco and tyre barrier with the car's rear and stopping the session for half an hour. His teammate Rahel Frey lost control of the sister No. 61 Ford in the same sequence of corners, removing the rear wing against the wall. Both vehicles were repaired in time for the first qualifying session.

Qualifying

The first of three two-hour qualifying sessions to set the race's starting order began late 9 June night, in dry and cool conditions. Nicolas Lapierre set the early pace in the No. 4 Oreca Peugeot with a 3 minutes, 21.192 seconds lap until a fuel pick-up issue forced him to stop at Arnage corner and ended his team's running for the session. Bourdais then bettered Lapierre's lap time to a 3 minutes, 19.711 seconds in the final half an hour, putting the No. 3 Peugeot on provisional pole position. Alexander Wurz's and Stéphane Sarrazin's sister Nos. 1 and 3 Peugeots followed in second and third with Lapierre's No. 4 Oreca car fourth. The quickest two Audis were the No. 9 and 8 entries of Mike Rockenfeller and Benoît Tréluyer in fifth and sixth. Kane put the Strakka HPD ARX-01 car on provisional pole in LMP2 with a lap of 3 minutes, 36.168 seconds, ahead of Brabham's Highcroft entry and Olivier Pla's Quifel ASM Team Ginetta-Zytek GZ09S/2 car. An early lap by Enge in the Young Driver AMR Aston Martin was enough to lead the LMGT1 category. Enge's lap was two seconds faster than Thomas Mutsch in Matech's second-placed No. 60 Ford followed by LAA's Corvettes of Julien Jousse and Jérôme Policand in third and fourth. Gianmaria Bruni put the No. 82 Risi Competizione Ferrari on provisional pole in LMGT2 even after the car developed a broken gearbox output shaft that required the attention of mechanics in the garage for most of the session. The Nos. 63 and 64 Corvettes of Jan Magnussen and Emmanuel Collard were second and third in category. Separate accidents for the right-front of the No. 88 Team Felbermayr-Proton Porsche blocking the circuit and Matías Russo with the rear the No. 96 AF Corse Ferrari exiting the Porsche Curves caused interruptions to the session.

Following the session, Russo was transported to the medical centre and found to be unhurt. AF Corse withdrew the No. 96 Ferrari from the race due to heavy damage to the car and lack of spare parts. The second session on 10 June commenced on a damp circuit following an earlier downpour but it quickly dried as qualifying progressed. Wurz led the session with a 3 minutes, 23.238 seconds lap, but the No. 1 Peugeot remained second overall after Wurz was unable to lap faster amongst slower cars. The sister Peugeots driven by Sarrazin and Simon Pagenaud were second and third. Brabham gave the debuting Highcroft HPD ARX-01C vehicle provisional pole position in LMP2 with an improved lap of 3 minutes, 34.537 seconds to overtake the Strakka entry by 1.6 seconds. The Quifel ASM Team Ginetta remained third in category. In LMGT1, Bas Leinders moved the No. 70 Marc VDS Racing Team Ford GT past the No. 60 Matech car to second in class behind Enge's category-leading Young Driver AMR Aston Martin. Similarly, second place in LMGT2 was taken by AF Corse SRL's No. 95 Ferrari of Toni Vilander who set a lap almost three seconds faster and progressed four positions in class. Although there were crashes for Manuel Rodrigues' No. 13 Kolles Audi in the Porsche Curves, the No. 13 Rebellion Racing Lola B10/60 of Jean-Christophe Boullion at Karting corner, Mike Newton's No. 25 RML entry at Tertre Rouge turn and a collision between Jacques Nicolet and Stephane Salini on the inside at the Ford chicane, the session was not halted.

Conditions continued to be dry for the final session that night. Only a few cars were able to improve their lap times and Bourdais' pole position time from the first session was not bettered. Peugeot secured their fourth successive pole position at Le Mans. Bourdais' No. 3 Peugeot led the session with the day's quickest lap, a 3 minutes, 20.212 seconds. Audi improved all three of their cars during the session to be 2.2 seconds behind the four Peugeots. Rockenfeller's No. 9 entry was the highest-placed Audi in fifth with McNish's No. 7 car sixth and Marcel Fässler's No. 8 entry seventh. In LMP2, HPD-powered cars took the first three places. Watts set a 3 minutes, 33.079 seconds lap in Strakka's car in the final hour to start first in category. Brabham was unable to better Highcroft's lap due to traffic and fell to second. Enge's first session lap in the Young Driver AMR Aston Martin was unchallenged in LMGT1 and he achieved his sixth category pole position in eight years. Leinders' second session lap put the Marc VDS Ford second and Grosjean bettered the No. 60 Matech Ford's best lap to put it third in class. The LMGT2 lead remained with Bruni's No. 82 Risi Ferrari which set no laps during the session because it was fitted with a race-specific gearbox and engine. The two Corvettes of Oliver Gavin and Antonio García displaced the No. 95 AF Corse SRL Ferrari to be second and third in category. Fewer incidents occurred during the session as teams focused on the race.

Post-qualifying

The No. 82 Risi Ferrari was put under an ACO scrutineering inspection after the third qualifying session. Marshals failed the car's inspection when they adjudged that the gurney flap on the rear wing was too low, demoting the vehicle to the rear of the LMGT2 starting order. The No. 64 Corvette was promoted to pole position in LMGT2 with the sister No. 63 car second in category.
The tub of the No. 13 Rebellion Lola car was sent to a nearby carbon fibre workshop to have a small hole in it repaired.

Qualifying results

Pole position winners in each class are indicated in bold. The fastest time set by each entry is denoted in gray.

Warm-up

The drivers were given a 45-minute warm-up session on the morning of 12 June. Cars were driven on intermediate rain tyres due to a wet track created by overnight rain and several drivers were caught out by the damp surface. Audi and Peugeot exchanged the fastest lap until McNish in the No. 7 Audi went quickest overall with a time of 3 minutes, 51.401 seconds. Gené was the fastest Peugeot in second place driving the No. 1 car followed by his teammate Montagny's No. 3 entry in third. The quickest LMP2 time was a 4 minutes, 8.262 seconds set by Marco Werner in Highcroft's entry over Erdos' second-placed RML car. Leinders in the Marc VDS Ford GT was the fastest driver in LMGT1 while Jean Alesi put the No. 95 AF Corse SRL Ferrari first in LMGT2. Tim Greaves damaged the front-left of the No. 41 Team Bruichladdich Ginetta-Zytek vehicle and the No. 73 LAA Corvette sustained a left-rear puncture.

Race

Start and first hours

The race commenced in front of a crowd of 238,150 people at 15:00 local time on 12 June, with the waving of the French tricolour by Rolex CEO Bruno Meier and triple Olympic skiing champion Jean-Claude Killy. The ambient temperature for both days was predicted to be around . During a reconnaissance lap, the No. 80 Flying Lizard Motorsports Porsche driven by Neel Jani sustained a left-rear puncture when Jani went over a screw, overshot the Dunlop Chicane and mounted the kerbs. Jani entered the pit lane and no bodywork damage was discovered. Lamy in the pole-sitting No. 3 Peugeot maintained the lead for the opening laps with his factory teammates Montagny and Gené exchanging second and third places on the third lap. Lapierre, driving the No. 4 Oreca Peugeot, prevented McNish's No. 7 Audi from passing him for fourth. The first lap also saw the race's first retirement as the No. 19 Autocon Motorsports Lola driven by Mike Lewis stopped after Arnage turn with gearbox input shaft failure. Julien Jousse's No. 73 LAA Corvette overtook Mutsch's No. 60 Matech Ford for third in LMGT1 as the class became a battle between Leinders' No. 70 Marc VDS Ford and Peter Kox's No. 52 Young Driver AMR Aston Martin as Patrick Long progressed to third in LMGT2.

At high-speed on the back straight, Nigel Mansell crashed the No. 5 Beechdean Motorsport Ginetta Zytek into the barriers between Mulsanne and Indianapolis turns due to a slow left-rear puncture that the team was unable to detect because that part of the circuit was not covered by telemetry. Safety cars were deployed for 31 minutes to allow track marshals to repair the damage to the Armco barriers, and a motionless Mansell remained in the car until doctors transported him by ambulance to the track's medical centre for check-ups and then to the local hospital. The accident caused Mansell to suffer from amnesia, haematoma on his brain and a neck injury. When the safety cars were withdrawn, Mutsch passed Kox for the LMGT1 lead after both drivers made pit stops under safety car conditions. At the front, the safety cars had divided the field up, leaving the three factory Peugeots 57 seconds ahead of three Audis. The lead of LMP2 became a duel between Kane's No. 42 Strakka and Brabham's No. 26 Highcroft entries. Montagny had made a pit stop earlier than teammate Lamy but Montagny's stop was two seconds quicker than Lamy, moving the No. 2 Peugeot to first. Soheil Ayari attempted to lap the No. 24 OAK Pescarolo of Jean-François Yvon at Mulsanne turn but the two cars collided and Ayari's No. 6 Oreca spun.

Before the second hour concluded, Dirk Müller stopped the No. 79 BMW on the first Mulsanne Straight chicane so he could conduct an inspection after feeling a right-rear problem. Müller discovered a right-rear puncture and was circumspect en route to the pit lane, where it was found that the vehicle's underside was damaged by kerbstones when Müller stopped. Not long after Leinders lost control of the second-placed LMGT1 No. 70 Ford because of an underinflated left-rear tyre from running on the same tyre compounds since the start and impacted the tyre wall in the downhill Esses with the car's right-rear. Leinders was able to return the car to the pit lane but the damage to it necessitated its retirement. The third hour saw Lamy in the race-leading No. 3 Peugeot slow at Tetre Rouge corner with smoke coming from the right-front tyre being pressed against the bodywork. Lamy entered the garage to retire the car because of the lower front-right suspension mounting point to the chassis being pulled out of the tub from mounting the kerbs too hard. The retirement promoted Oreca's No. 4 Peugeot to third and Tom Kristensen's No. 7 Audi to fourth. Enge in the No. 52 Young Driver AMR car had been lapping faster than the No. 73 LAA car of Xavier Maassen and overtook the Corvette for second in LMGT1.

The LMGT2 lead became a three-car battle between Beretta's No. 64 Corvette and Johnny O'Connell's sister No. 63 entry with Bruni in the No. 82 Risi Ferrari drawing closer to Beretta and O'Connell. Bruni and Beretta exchanged the lead several times over the following four hours. This was due to the Risi Ferrari being better able to conserve fuel than the Corvette. At the beginning of the fourth hour, Peter Dumbreck lost control of the No. 85 Spyker C8 at Indianapolis corner and was collected by the No. 38 Pegasus Racing Norma entry of Frederic de Rocha after again going off the circuit in the Porsche Curves. De Rocha's car was sent into the outside barrier and it sustained unrepairable damage to its rear end and transmission that necessitated its retirement in the garage. Anthony Davidson was lapping faster than his Peugeot teammate Sarrazin in the No. 2 car and moved the No. 1 entry to the overall race lead during a pit stop cycle. The No. 9 Audi of Romain Dumas made minor contact with a television camera operator working for Speed during a routine pit stop, removing the car's right-front side-view mirror and knocking the camera operator to the ground. The camera operator was transported out of the pit lane on a stretcher with a damaged shoulder and gashed leg.

Evening to dawn

Kristensen in the fourth-placed No. 7 Audi was approaching a slow Andy Priaulx on the racing line because Priaulx was nursing a front-left puncture on the No. 79 BMW in the high-speed Porsche Curves. Priaulx steered left in the first right-hand corner to allow Kristensen past but Kristensen had no space to pass on the outside and spun backwards into the tyre wall. Kristensen was recovered from the gravel and the resulting pit stop to replace the damaged rear bodywork lost the No. 7 Audi three laps and fell to seventh. Before the sixth hour ended, Bryce Miller crashed the No. 92 JMW Motorsport Aston Martin at the Porsche Curves hard enough to warrant the car's retirement, bringing out the safety cars for the second time to allow marshals to clean the track and extricate the stricken car. During this slow period, Manuel Rodrigues damaged the front-left of the No. 14 Kolles Audi against the wall at the right-hand kink before Indianapolis turn and had to bring the car into the garage to repair the front bodywork. Nick Leventis spun the No. 42 Strakka HPD on cold tyres into the inside Dunlop Chicane gravel trap but was recovered by a tractor and his team temporarily relinquished the LMP2 lead to Werner's No. 26 Highcroft car when it made a pit stop for checks.

When racing resumed, Rockenfeller ran wide leaving the Porsche Curves in the No. 9 Audi and his teammate Tréluyer in the sister No. 8 entry overtook him for third into the Ford Chicane. Almost immediately, Tréluyer damaged the nose of the No. 8 Audi on the kerbing and the resulting pit stop promoted the No. 9 car back ahead. The No. 1 Peugeot continued to hold sway at the front until Gené relinquished the lead the car had held for 59 consecutive laps, when the car was pushed into the garage with alternator failure which required the replacement of the alternator and electronic control unit. The stop lost the No. 1 Peugeot twelve minutes and it fell four laps down in seventh. Jaime Melo's No. 82 Risi Ferrari bowed out of the duel for the LMGT2 lead when it was forced to the garage to fix intermittent gear selection issues but the repairs to it did not rectify the problem and the car was retired. This promoted the No. 64 Corvette of Gavin to the category lead with his teammate Magnussen in the No. 63 car second. Strakka's No. 42 car continued to hold sway in LMP2 but Brabham in the Highcroft entry was closing the gap to Watts while Gene in the No. 1 Peugeot was recovering ground and gaining on McNish's fifth-placed No. 7 Audi.

In the tenth hour, Yvon removed the No. 24 OAK Pescarolo's front-left corner in a collision with the barriers at the Ford Chicane after colliding with the rear of Mutsch's No. 60 Matech Ford and pushed him wide to the inside under braking. The safety cars were dispatched for the third time for nine minutes because marshals were required to remove debris from the circuit. Yvon was able to drive across the circuit and enter the garage for repairs to the No. 24 Pescarolo. Mutsch also entered the pit lane for repairs and forfeited the LMGT1 class lead to Larbre Compétition's No. 50 Saleen of Gabriele Gardel. When racing resumed, Davidson had an anxious moment in the No. 1 Peugeot when he collected Alesi's slower No. 95 AF Corse Ferrari on the inside at the Dunlop Chicane and went into the gravel trap but he recovered with marshal assistance after losing a further 90 seconds to Kristensen's No. 7 Audi and made a pit stop for new front bodywork. Marino Franchitti in the No. 42 Highcroft car suffered a puncture that sent him into the gravel and extended Watts' No. 26 Strakka car lead by two-and-a-half laps but Franchitti remained second in LMP2. Duval brought the second-placed No. 4 Oreca Peugeot into the garage for a quarter of an hour with repairable right-hand side driveshaft failure among other technical issues and the car fell to sixth overall.

As the race approached half distance, Sarrazin's No. 2 Peugeot led from Dumas' No. 9 Audi and André Lotterer's sister No. 8 entry. Strakka's No. 42 car driven by Leventis continued to lead LMP2 lead because his team was faster than Highcroft. The LMGT1 category was headed by Gardel's No. 50 Larbre Saleen by two laps over Jousse's No. 73 LAA Corvette while LMGT2 was led by Collard's No. 64 Corvette over his teammate García in the No. 63 car. Nicolas Minassian relieved Sarrazin in the race-leading No. 2 Peugeot and he extended the car's lead to a single lap over the second-placed No. 8 Audi of Lotterer after it sustained a right-rear puncture on its out-lap and a leaking airjack at a routine pit stop lost him a further half a minute. Rockenfeller and later Timo Bernhard and their teammate Lotterer went quicker around this point and Minassian set faster lap times to further increase the No. 2 Peugeot's overall lead. The No. 60 Matech Ford GT that was in third position in LMGT2 was retired after attempts to restart the engine by adding oil and water to it were unsuccessful. Enge in the Young Driver car was lapping faster and passed the No. 73 LAA Corvette for third in LMGT1. Werner's Highcroft LMP2 car lost further ground to the class-leading Strakka entry when it entered the pit lane to replace the rear wing section and another pit stop that was slow due to a faulty left-front wheel nut.

Morning to finish

In the early morning, Erdos moved the No. 25 RML entry to third in LMP2 when the No. 35 OAK Pescarolo was driven into the garage and Olivier Pla in the No. 40 Quifel-entered car went off the circuit at Arnage corner but recovered with assistance from marshals. Some teams also took the opportunity to switch their brake discs and calipers at this stage in the event, including the No. 64 Corvette of Beretta that was leading in LMGT2. Smoke and fire began billowing from the right-hand exhaust of the race-leading No. 2 Peugeot of Montagny at Tetre Rouge corner due to connecting rod failure. The Peugeot would later be abandoned at the side of the track on the Mulsanne Straight since Montagny could not drive to the pit lane and the overall lead the car had held for the previous 144 laps was ceded to Bernhard's No. 9 Audi. The No. 63 Corvette stopped with García driving into Indianapolis corner with sudden engine crank sensor failure that warranted its retirement from second in LMGT2. This moved Lieb's No. 77 Felbermayr-Proton Porsche to second and Vilander's No. 95 AF Corse Ferrari to third in category.

The second placed car in LMGT1, the No. 73 LAA Corvette, was driven off the circuit on the approach to Indianapolis corner by Jousse and was retired with sudden transmission component failure. This elevated the No. 52 Young Driver AMR car of Christoffer Nygaard and Policand's No. 72 LAA entry to second and third in class, respectively. Not long after the LMGT2 class-leading No. 64 Corvette driven by Collard was caught off guard by Davidson's No. 1 Peugeot while Davidson was attempting to lap an unsighted Collard on the inside in the Porsche Curves. Collard spun backwards into the barrier and heavily damaged the Corvette's rear but was unhurt. He had difficulty returning to the garage for rear-end repairs and components changes that took 32 minutes to complete. Davidson, however, was immediately able to return to the pit lane to repair the Peugeot. The accident led to the race's fourth safety car intervention for nine minutes to allow marshals to clear debris from the circuit and repair the damaged Armco barrier in the Porsche Curves.

After green flag racing resumed, Lieb's No. 77 Felbermayr-Proton Porsche had assumed the LMGT2 lead that the No. 64 Corvette had maintained for 141 consecutive laps with the No. 89 Farnbacher Ferrari of Allan Simonsen second in class. Franchitti maintained the Highcroft LMP2 entry's hold on second in class until a water leak problem and a cooling system pressure fault forced him to enter the garage several times and drop down the class order. Larbre Compétition had an anxious moment when Roland Berville beached the No. 50 Saleen in the gravel close to the pit lane entry. Mechanics removed gravel from under the car but it retained the LMGT1 lead by six laps over the Young Driver team. Gavin retired the No. 64 Corvette on the exit to Mulsanne corner with smoke billowing from the left-hand exhaust, which was a lasting legacy of Collard's earlier collision with Davidson. Giancarlo Fisichella locked the front tyres on the No. 95 AF Corse Ferrari and entered the escape road at Indianapolis corner. The resulting pit stop to repair front-end damage lost the No. 95 car second in LMGT2 to Simonsen's No. 89 Farnbacher Ferrari.

Strakka was required to repair the bodywork on Leventis' No. 42 car when he sustained a left-rear puncture but retained the LMP2 lead by five laps over Guillaume Moreau's No. 35 OAK Pescarolo. Lotterer locked the tyres on the No. 8 Audi and struck the tyre wall at Arnage corner, which necessitated a pit stop for new front bodywork. This enabled Wurz in the recovering No. 1 Peugeot to pass Lotterer for second at the Michelin chicane after a short battle before falling back behind the No. 8 Audi. Wurz had unlapped the No. 1 Peugeot from the lead Audi before the car was retired in the pit lane with white smoke billowing from the engine compartment's right-hand side turn due to connecting rod failure.
The No. 1 Peugeot's retirement elevated Kristensen's No. 7 Audi to third overall and Lapierre's No. 4 Oreca Peugeot to fourth. Rockenfeller made an unscheduled pit stop in the race-leading No. 9 Audi because he felt a vibration, which the team determined was caused by a wheel turned on the rim. Fifteen minutes after Nygaard began driving the No. 52 Young Driver AMR car for its final stint, a drive shaft failed, causing him to enter the garage to allow mechanics to replace it but the team fell to third, behind Policand's No. 72 Luc Alphand Aventures Corvette. Duval relieved Lapierre in the No. 4 Oreca Peugeot and closed to within ten seconds of Rinaldo Capello's third-placed Audi when the car retired with flames coming from its right-hand underside into Indianapolis corner because of a major oil fire.

Bernhard, Dumas and Rockenfeller maintained the lead the No. 9 Audi had held for the final 133 laps, and achieved their first Le Mans victories and Audi's ninth since its first in 2000 in a record-breaking 397 laps, covering . They finished a lap ahead of Fässler, Lotterer and Tréluyer's sister No. 8 car in second and the No. 7 car of Capello, Kristensen and McNish followed another two laps behind in third to complete an Audi sweep of the overall podium. The No. 42 Strakka HPD car of Kane, Leventis and Watts maintained its lead in LMP2 for 267 successive laps to win the category by six laps ahead of the second-placed No. 35 OAK Pescarolo and nine laps over the third-placed No. 25 RML Lola car. Larbre Compétition held their four-lap lead in LMGT1 and the No. 50 Saleen of Berville, Julien Canal and Gardel achieved the team's fifth class victory. The No. 72 LAA Corvette in second and the third-placed No. 52 Young Driver AMR Aston Martin completed the class podium and were its final finishers. Following the retirement of the No. 64 Corvette, the No. 77 Felbermayr-Proton Porsche maintained the lead of LMGT2 to win the category, earning Lieb and Richard Lietz their second category victories and Wolf Henzler's first. Team Farnbacher finished second in class, two laps behind the Felbermayr-Proton Porsche, and BMS Scuderia Italia were another nine laps adrift in third.

Post-race

The top three finishing teams in each category appeared on the podium to collect their trophies and in the subsequent press conference. Dumas said that he thought he could win even though some of the French press told him he could not, adding: "We knew we had reliability, and that was very important I think – and we had no problems on the car. It just kept running and running without any mistakes." Bernhard commented: "We talked about it, among the three of us, about how it would feel just to stand on the podium with the whole crowd on the bottom cheering and then a couple of days later we achieved that." Rockenfeller said he was overwhelmed that he had achieved his objective of winning at Le Mans: "I managed to win, with Timo (Bernhard) and Romain (Dumas). Thank you to everyone. My thanks to Audi, to the Joest team, our crew. Great!" Audi technical director Ralf Jüttner heralded the winning-Audi's distance record as reliability not becoming a factor, "Nobody retires nowadays. The cars normally last. It's all about who is fast and who is slower."

Kristensen did not believe Priaulx had seen his approaching car, saying: "It's Le Mans, so you should always expect the unexpected – and in a way I guess you could say I didn't expect that enough, but when there's a BMW driving with three very good and professional drivers, I would expect them to see me and not change the racing line when I'm coming ehindwith a lot more speed." He later said that he had forgiven Priaulx: "At the time it was very frustrating, but when you look at the whole picture it is not so bad. We have finished on the podium. It's part of the way things work at this race." Priaulx admitted he was disappointed to have been a contributing factor in the accident, commenting: "It wasn't like a last minute thing that I decided to go left, but he had committed. People have told me I am not, but my gut feeling is that I am responsible, but sometimes I am very hard on myself."

Pagenaud affirmed Peugeot would return to Le Mans in 2011 and win the race and described the team's emotions at having all three of their cars retire: "Everyone in the team is in tears. This team is like a family and to win this race would have meant so much to us." Davidson was pleased with his race performance and felt he could demonstrate his ability at Le Mans after being judged on his results in the high-profile Formula One series. He said he and Peugeot were inspired by potentially winning the event before the conclusion of his quadruple stint. Strakka team manager Piers Phillips praised the team, saying: "Strakka is here for the long term, and this win, as fantastic as it is, is not the peak of our ambitions. It's the platform from which we can move forward. We've proved a point, set a precedent, and raised expectations." Canal acknowledged that his team did not anticipate getting the opportunity to win in LMGT1 and team owner Jack Leconte was pleased to claim the category victory as a privateer entry after previously receiving manufacturer support.

Race results

Class winners are marked in bold. Cars failing to complete 70 per cent of winner's distance (277 laps) are marked as Not Classified (NC).

Footnotes

References

External links

*

{{24 Hours of Le Mans

24 Hours of Le Mans races
Le Mans
24 Hours of Le Mans