Qualifying report
WEC 24 Hours of Le Mans
Le Mans 24h: Toyota narrowly beats Rebellion to pole
Kamui Kobayashi has gifted Toyota another pole at the Le Mans 24 Hours after beating Rebellion’s Gustavo Menezes in a tightly-contested Hyperpole session.
Filip Cleeren
Edited: Sep 18, 2020, 2:40 PM
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The new-for-2020 Hyperpole shootout gave the fastest six cars in each class in Thursday’s first qualifying session a chance to fight for pole in a condensed 30-minute session on Friday morning.
In the #7 Toyota TS050 Hybrid Kamui Kobayashi clocked a first flying lap of 3m15.920s, comfortably quicker than teammate Kazuki Nakajima’s 3m17.424s.
Rebellion returned fire by virtue of a stellar 3m15.822s from Gustavo Menezes in the #1 Rebellion R-13, the fastest ever lap around the Circuit de la Sarthe for a privateer and a non-hybrid car.
That prompted Kobayashi to respond with an even quicker lap aboard the #7, posting a 3m15.267s on his next attempt. Nakajima too went quicker on his second attempt, but stayed third with a 3m16.649s, ahead of the second Rebellion of Louis Deletraz.
The Japanese driver look set to take another six tenths out of his time the following lap, but he aborted the lap because of a track limits transgression - denying him the chance to beat his own lap record from three years ago.
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Tom Dillmann’s #4 ByKolles machine brought up the rear of the five-car LMP1 field, the ENSO CLM P1/01 barely ahead of the LMP2 runners.
In LMP2 Paul di Resta put the #22 United Autosports Oreca on top early on with a 3m24.528s, a new all-time record for the class, followed by Jean-Eric Vergne in the #26 G-Drive entry and Will Stevens in the JOTA Sport-run #37 Jackie Chan DC Racing car.
In the #33 High Class Racing Oreca, Toyota protege Kenta Yamashita then jumped Stevens to take third, only to then be demoted himself by a late effort from Nyck de Vries in the #29 Racing Team Nederland Oreca.
FIA F2 champion De Vries had survived an early scare in the Porsche Curves, going straight on into the gravel trap but narrowly avoiding the barriers on his way out.
Porsche scored pole in the GTE Pro class thanks to Gianmaria Bruni's 3m50.874s effort in the #91 911 RSR-19, albeit almost three seconds down on 2019's class pole time.
Sam Bird led the early proceedings in the #71 AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE Evo, his time of 3m51.515s actually two tenths slower than GTE Am’s provisional polesitter Matt Campbell in the Proton Porsche.
Bruni then went faster in the #91 Porsche, before Marco Sorensen lifted his #95 Aston Martin Vantage up to second. In the closing stages, James Calado vaulted over Sorensen to second in the #51 AF Corse Ferrari, while the #97 Aston of Alex Lynn went fourth.
In GTE Am Campbell’s early benchmark was eventually bettered by Come Ledogar in the #61 Luzich Ferrari, the Frenchman posting a 3m51.266s.
That was just over half a tenth quicker than Campbell and four tenths quicker than Matteo Cairoli in the #56 Team Project 1 Porsche.
Qualifying results:
Pos. # Drivers Car Class Time Gap Interval 1 7 
Mike Conway
Kamui Kobayashi
Jose Maria Lopez Toyota TS050 Hybrid LMP1 3'15.267 2 1 
Bruno Senna
Norman Nato
Gustavo Menezes Rebellion R13 LMP1 3'15.822 0.555 0.555 3 8 
Sebastien Buemi
Kazuki Nakajima
Brendon Hartley Toyota TS050 Hybrid LMP1 3'16.649 1.382 0.827 4 3 Romain Dumas
Nathanael Berthon
Louis Deletraz Rebellion R13 LMP1 3'18.330 3.063 1.681 5 4 Tom Dillmann
Bruno Spengler
Oliver Webb ENSO CLM P1/01 LMP1 3'23.043 7.776 4.713 6 22 Philip Hanson
Filipe Albuquerque
Paul di Resta Oreca 07 LMP2 3'24.528 9.261 1.485 7 26 
Roman Rusinov
Jean-Eric Vergne
Mikkel Jensen Aurus 01 LMP2 3'24.860 9.593 0.332 8 29 
Frits van Eerd
Giedo van der Garde
Nyck de Vries Oreca 07 LMP2 3'25.062 9.795 0.202 9 33 Kenta Yamashita
Mark Patterson
Anders Fjordbach Oreca 07 LMP2 3'25.426 10.159 0.364 10 32 William Owen
Alex Brundle
Job van Uitert Oreca 07 LMP2 3'25.671 10.404 0.245 11 37 
Ho-Pin Tung
Gabriel Aubry
Will Stevens Oreca 07 LMP2 3'25.875 10.608 0.204 12 91 
Gianmaria Bruni
Richard Lietz
Frederic Makowiecki Porsche 911 RSR - 19 LMGTE PRO 3'50.874 35.607 24.999 13 51 Alessandro Pier Guidi
James Calado
Daniel Serra Ferrari 488 GTE EVO LMGTE PRO 3'51.115 35.848 0.241 14 95 Nicki Thiim
Marco Sorensen
Richard Westbrook Aston Martin Vantage AMR LMGTE PRO 3'51.241 35.974 0.126 15 61 Francesco Piovanetti
Oswaldo Negri Jr
Come Ledogar Ferrari 488 GTE EVO LMGTE AM 3'51.266 35.999 0.025 16 77 
Christian Ried
Riccardo Pera
Matt Campbell Porsche 911 RSR LMGTE AM 3'51.322 36.055 0.056 17 97 
Maxime Martin
Alex Lynn
Harry Tincknell Aston Martin Vantage AMR LMGTE PRO 3'51.324 36.057 0.002 18 71 Davide Rigon
Miguel Molina
Sam Bird Ferrari 488 GTE EVO LMGTE PRO 3'51.515 36.248 0.191 19 56 
Egidio Perfetti
Larry ten Voorde
Matteo Cairoli Porsche 911 RSR LMGTE AM 3'51.647 36.380 0.132 20 92 Michael Christensen
Kevin Estre
Laurens Vanthoor Porsche 911 RSR - 19 LMGTE PRO 3'51.770 36.503 0.123 21 98 Paul Dalla Lana
Ross Gunn
Augusto Farfus Aston Martin Vantage AMR LMGTE AM 3'52.105 36.838 0.335 22 90 
Salih Yoluc
Charlie Eastwood
Jonathan Adam Aston Martin Vantage AMR LMGTE AM 3'52.299 37.032 0.194 23 86 Michael Wainwright
Ben Barker
Andrew Watson Porsche 911 RSR LMGTE AM 3'52.346 37.079 0.047
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