The Russians had won the first "24 hours of Le Mans"

18 June 2018

The results of the toughest races of the year

Ended one of the most famous automobile races "24 hours Le-Mana". But in recent years, and even decades, she is known not only for its demands on the reliability of equipment, but also the predictability of the results. Favorites are well known to all: the most gold medals overall in the class of 2000 took the Audi. However, with the 2015 endurance racing dominated her sister, Porsche. But the problem is that Audi has gone from "Le Mans" in 2016, and Porsche — in the 2017th. So the 2018 season brought several surprises.

LMP1: triumph Toyota

After the withdrawal of Audi and Porsche in the "24 hours of Le Mans" among the factory teams left, only the Toyota Gazoo Racing. Needless to say that she won the race? With a lag of two laps finished and their colleagues. From the Swiss Rebellion Racing trailed far behind: +12 laps for the first team and 13 for the second.

And where is the Russian team SMP Racing Boris Rotenberg? In the qualification both crews did very well, demonstrating an acceptable gap from Toyota Gazoo Racing and Rebellion Racing. And in the beginning of the race everything went well: Stephane Sarrazin managed to bring the car to third place in the overall classification. Thus due to the higher efficiency machine SMP Racing rarely called in on pit-stops, than the cars of Rebellion Racing. What is not a prerequisite for "bronze" (the first two places for "Toyota)?

But on the eighth hour of the race Matevos Isaakyan at a speed of 270 km/h do not fit into the turn and the stern came into contact with the bump. The pilot was able to remove the damaged wing and even to pull away, but leaked from a broken coolant got in the way.

Even earlier, in the second hour of the race, stood 11th the crew, which included Vitaly Petrov, Jenson button and Mikhail Aleshin. It was a faulty sensor. But even after fixing faulty equipment is not allowed to finish: 40 minutes before the end of the race the motor broke down.

LMP2: victory for G-Drive Racing

If in the LMP1 class it was meant to be (even given the fact that earlier, Toyota didn't become the winner), in LMP2 remained the intrigue. It's the sweeter the victory of the Russian G-Drive Racing.

The team participates in the endurance race in 2013. a "we had a lot of attempts, finally we managed it. In fact, I never realized that we won. It's cool!" — said Roman Rusinov, the only pilot in the squad of G-Drive Racing. Worked with him the French Jean-Eric Vergne and Andrea Pizzitola.

a "It was a great race, we did. The last hour was the most difficult, it would be easier if I was in the car. This is the first Russian victory in the LMP2", — said Mr. Rusinov.