Le Mans: Pippa Mann qualifying report

DISAPPOINTING QUALIFYING IN LE MANS

Pippa Mann had a less than desirable qualifying session for the French round of the World Series by Renault event at Le Mans. The young Brit found herself down in 11th place in group, unable to better her time and therefore forced to accept a lowly 22nd position for Race One.

Mann's speed had looked promising in Thursday testing, with the P1 Motorsport driver setting competitive times despite not doing a new tyre run like most of the field. However, missing a fair amount of the testing due to a spin on Thursday and then rain closing in over the circuit for most of Friday made Saturday's qualifying an unknown, and unfortunately for Mann, on this occasion it was not to be.

Speaking about qualifying, Mann said: "I'm really disappointed with that - I actually thought we might have enough pace to challenge for a place in Super Pole, but I just couldn't get the car working across an entire lap. We've had a problem in the slower corners, so changed the set-up in an attempt to combat whatever was causing the issue. The car responded much better in the slower turns, but we compromised the overall performance - we'll have to look at our options for the race."

Back on the 11th row Mann will have a lot of ground to make up, but knows anything is possible, "As Race One from the Nurburgring demonstrated, a lot can happen across a race distance and it doesn't matter so much where you start from, but where you are at the end. We'll give it our best shot - every point counts for the championship right now so we have to approach it with that in mind."

-credit: pm