Le Mans 24h: Kobayashi tops warm-up for Toyota

Kobayashi's lap of 3m19.647s was over four seconds slower than the #7 TS050 Hybrid's pole time as teams naturally took a conservative approach ahead of the race. 

The #7 Toyota's best time was set late in the 45-minute session and was enough to beat the #8 car's 3m20.689s effort set by Sebastien Buemi by 1.042s.

Thomas Laurent, who was confirmed as a Signatech Alpine LMP2 driver for the 2019/20 WEC season on Friday, placed the #3 Rebellion R-13 third. 

Laurent had a slight off at one of the Mulsanne chicanes midway through the session before setting his best time of 3m21.868s, just over one second off the leading Toyota's best lap.

The two SMP Racing BR Engineering BR1s took fourth and fifth with the #17 entry beating the sister car courtesy of Stephane Sarrazin's 3m21.869s laptime. Vitaly Petrov gave the #11 SMP machine its best time of 3m22.813s.

The #10 DragonSpeed BR1 was sixth ahead of the #1 Rebellion, with both cars setting their best laps in the final moments of the session.

Ben Hanley gave DragonSpeed the edge with his 3m23.735s and lapping almost three seconds clear of Bruno Senna's Rebellion benchmark. 

ByKolles ended up slowest of the LMP1s and ninth overall after Tom Dillmann locked up under braking for the Dunlop Chicane, crossing the gravel and the run-off on the outside of the corner.

Jean-Eric Vergne set the fastest time in LMP2 early in the session in the #26 G-Drive Racing Oreca, 1.4s clear of TDS Racing stablemate and polesitter Loic Duval.

Vergne, who qualified fifth, managed a best time of 3m28.763s, 2.5s slower than his best time from Thursday night.

Nicolas Lapierre took third late in the session in the #36 Signatech Alpine to complete an all-Oreca top three, bumping Nigel Moore’s Inter Europol Competition Ligier down to fourth.  

GTE: Estre fastest for Porsche

Porsches were fastest in both GTE classes, with Kevin Estre putting the works #92 car on top in the Pro division by a little more than a second.

Estre's fastest time, a 3m50.095s, was just over two seconds shy of the fastest GTE Pro qualifying time, and 1.001s off the time that put the #92 car seventh on the grid.

Harry Tincknell leapt the #67 Ford GT he shares with Andy Priaulx and Jonathan Bomarito up to second with a 3m51.133s lap with 10 minutes to go, and had been fastest of all through the first split on his next lap before a full-course yellow was issued.

The #71 and #51 AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTEs had occupied third and fourth in the closing stages of the session, but were split late on by the #68 Ford GT thanks to Dirk Muller's 3m51.637s lap.

Darren Turner put the class polesitting #95 Aston Martin Vantage GTE sixth, ahead of the lead BMW of Antonio Felix da Costa, who was 1.797s off the pace.

Ben Barker put the Gulf Racing Porsche on top in GTE Am, his 3m54.071s leaving the #86 car 1.270s clear of the similar Team Project 1 911 RSR.

Additional reporting by James Newbold and Jack Cozens

Session results:

Cla	#	Drivers	Car	Class	Time	Gap
1	7	Mike Conway Kamui Kobayashi Jose Maria Lopez	Toyota TS050 Hybrid	LMP1	3'19.647
2	8	Sébastien Buemi Kazuki Nakajima Fernando Alonso	Toyota TS050 Hybrid	LMP1	3'20.689	1.042
3	3	Thomas Laurent Nathanael Berthon Gustavo Menezes	Rebellion R13	LMP1	3'21.868	2.221
4	17	Stéphane Sarrazin Egor Orudzhev Sergey Sirotkin	BR Engineering BR1	LMP1	3'21.869	2.222
5	11	Vitaly Petrov Mikhail Aleshin Stoffel Vandoorne	BR Engineering BR1	LMP1	3'22.813	3.166
6	10	Henrik Hedman Ben Hanley Renger van der Zande	BR Engineering BR1	LMP1	3'23.735	4.088
7	1	Neel Jani Andre Lotterer Bruno Senna	Rebellion R13	LMP1	3'26.324	6.677
8	26	Roman Rusinov Job Van Uitert Jean-Eric Vergne	Aurus 01	LMP2	3'28.763	9.116
9	4	Tom Dillmann Oliver Webb Paolo Ruberti	ENSO CLM P1/01	LMP1	3'28.935	9.288
10	28	François Perrodo Matthieu Vaxiviere Loic Duval	Oreca 07	LMP2	3'30.201	10.554
11	36	Nicolas Lapierre Andre Negrao Pierre Thiriet	Alpine A470	LMP2	3'31.080	11.433
12	34	Jakub Smiechowski James Winslow Nigel Moore	Ligier JSP 217	LMP2	3'31.311	11.664
13	31	Roberto Gonzalez Pastor Maldonado Anthony Davidson	Oreca 07	LMP2	3'31.328	11.681
14	38	Ho-Pin Tung Stéphane Richelmi Gabriel Aubry	Oreca 07	LMP2	3'31.506	11.859
15	30	Nico Jamin Pierre Ragues Romain Dumas	Oreca 07	LMP2	3'31.842	12.195
16	23	Rene Binder Julien Canal Will Stevens	Ligier JSP 217	LMP2	3'31.916	12.269
17	37	David Heinemeier Hansson Jordan King Ricky Taylor	Oreca 07	LMP2	3'31.996	12.349
18	20	Anders Fjordbach Dennis Andersen Mathias Beche	Oreca 07	LMP2	3'32.050	12.403
19	29	Frits van Eerd Giedo van der Garde Nyck de Vries	Dallara P217	LMP2	3'32.832	13.185
20	39	Tristan Gommendy Vincent Capillaire Jonathan Hirschi	Oreca 07	LMP2	3'32.874	13.227
21	32	Ryan Cullen Alex Brundle	Ligier JSP 217	LMP2	3'34.931	15.284
22	47	Roberto Lacorte Giorgio Sernagiotto Andrea Belicchi	Dallara P217	LMP2	3'35.283	15.636
23	22	Philip Hanson Filipe Albuquerque Paul di Resta	Ligier JSP 217	LMP2	3'36.697	17.050
24	49	Miro Konopka Henning Enqvist Konstantin Tereshchenko	Ligier JSP 217	LMP2	3'36.930	17.283
25	25	David Zollinger Andrea Pizzitola John Falb	Oreca 07	LMP2	3'38.008	18.361
26	92	Michael Christensen Kevin Estre Laurens Vanthoor	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	3'50.095	30.448
27	67	Andy Priaulx Harry Tincknell Jonathan Bomarito	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	3'51.133	31.486
28	71	Davide Rigon Sam Bird Miguel Molina	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE PRO	3'51.366	31.719
29	68	Joey Hand Dirk Muller Sébastien Bourdais	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	3'51.637	31.990
30	51	Alessandro Pier Guidi James Calado Daniel Serra	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE PRO	3'51.638	31.991
31	95	Marco Sorensen Nicki Thiim Darren Turner	Aston Martin Vantage AMR	LMGTE PRO	3'51.854	32.207
32	82	Augusto Farfus Antonio Felix da Costa Jesse Krohn	BMW M8 GTE	LMGTE PRO	3'51.892	32.245
33	91	Gianmaria Bruni Richard Lietz Frédéric Makowiecki	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	3'51.960	32.313
34	69	Ryan Briscoe Richard Westbrook Scott Dixon	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	3'52.173	32.526
35	81	Nick Catsburg Martin Tomczyk Philipp Eng	BMW M8 GTE	LMGTE PRO	3'52.446	32.799
36	97	Alex Lynn Maxime Martin Jonathan Adam	Aston Martin Vantage AMR	LMGTE PRO	3'52.618	32.971
37	93	Patrick Pilet Earl Bamber Nick Tandy	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	3'52.743	33.096
38	89	Pipo Derani Oliver Jarvis Jules Gounon	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE PRO	3'52.865	33.218
39	66	Stefan Mücke Olivier Pla Billy Johnson	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	3'53.094	33.447
40	63	Jan Magnussen Antonio Garcia Mike Rockenfeller	Chevrolet Corvette C7R	LMGTE PRO	3'53.588	33.941
41	64	Oliver Gavin Tommy Milner Marcel Fassler	Chevrolet Corvette C7R	LMGTE PRO	3'53.826	34.179
42	94	Sven Muller Mathieu Jaminet Dennis Olsen	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	3'53.989	34.342
43	86	Michael Wainwright Benjamin Barker Thomas Preining	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM	3'54.071	34.424
44	56	Jörg Bergmeister Patrick Lindsey Egidio Perfetti	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM	3'55.341	35.694
45	60	Claudio Schiavoni Andrea Piccini Sergio Pianezzola	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	3'55.516	35.869
46	98	Paul Dalla Lana Pedro Lamy Mathias Lauda	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE AM	3'56.458	36.811
47	54	Thomas Flohr Francesco Castellacci Giancarlo Fisichella	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	3'57.163	37.516
48	57	Takeshi Kimura Kei Cozzolino Côme Ledogar	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	3'57.673	38.026
49	61	Luis Perez Companc Matthew Griffin Matteo Cressoni	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	3'57.764	38.117
50	83	Manuela Gostner Rahel Frey Michelle Gatting	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	3'57.952	38.305
51	62	Cooper MacNeil Toni Vilander Robert Smith	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	3'58.908	39.261
52	84	Jeff Segal Rodrigo Baptista Wei Lu	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	3'58.931	39.284
53	70	Motoaki Ishikawa Olivier Beretta Eddie Cheever III	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	3'59.193	39.546
54	78	Louis Prette Philippe Prette Vincent Abril	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM	3'59.978	40.331
55	77	Matt Campbell Christian Ried Julien Andlauer	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM	4'02.643	42.996
56	50	Erwin Creed Romano Ricci Nicholas Boulle	Ligier JSP 217	LMP2	5'30.023	2'10.376
57	43	John Farano Arjun Maini Norman Nato	Oreca 07	LMP2
58	48	Paul Lafargue Paul-Loup Chatin Memo Rojas	Oreca 07	LMP2
59	85	Ben Keating Jeroen Bleekemolen Felipe Fraga	Ford GT	LMGTE AM
60	88	Satoshi Hoshino Giorgio Roda Matteo Cairoli	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM
61	90	Salih Yoluc Euan Hankey Charles Eastwood	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE AM
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