BMW beats Alpine in red-flagged FP3 as LMDh cars dominate

BMW claimed the top spot in third practice for the Le Mans 24 Hours following a late flying lap from one-lap specialist Dries Vanthoor.

The Belgian set a blistering time of 3m23.302s in the final minutes of the two-hour session, putting the #15 BMW M Hybrid V8 over four tenths ahead of Victor Martins in the #36 Alpine A424.

Jota’s Norman Nato led the way at the beginning of the session with a best time of 3m24.048s in the #12 Cadillac V-Series.R, with Ricky Taylor slotting into second in the additional Cadillac entered by Wayne Taylor Racing.

With about 25 minutes remaining on the clock, the session was stopped as United Autosports driver Daniel Schneider crashed heading into the final chicane, suffering significant damage to the front-left section of the #222 ORECA.

The Brazilian was able to bring the hobbling car back into the pits, allowing the session to resume shortly afterwards.

A flurry of improvements followed in the final minutes of practice, as several teams completed a qualifying simulation on soft tyres ahead of the grid-deciding Hyperpole session.

Vanthoor split the two Cadillacs on his first flying lap, before he moved to the front of the field on his final tour. At the same time, Martins moved up to second for Alpine, leaving the #12 Caddy in third place. Nato’s team-mate Will Stevens tried to respond with a late effort of his own, but ultimately ended up half a second off the pace.

Robin Frijns backed up Vanthoor’s performance with fourth place in the #20 BMW, while Mathys Jaubert propelled newcomer Genesis to fifth.

Despite losing the top spot towards the end, Cadillac enjoyed a strong evening at Circuit de la Sarthe, with its remaining two cars finishing sixth and eighth in practice. Jota driver Earl Bamber was fractionally than WTR’s Filipe Albuquerque, with the two Caddys split by the #35 Alpine of Charles Milesi.

The fastest LMH car was the #51 Ferrari 499P, Antonio Giovinazzi ending up 1.296s down on BMW’s pacesetting LMDh. Paul-Loup Chatin completed the top 10 for Genesis.

Apart from the late red-flag, the penultimate practice session of the week was also disrupted by a full-course yellow at around the 80-minute mark, as an incident between the #009 Aston Martin Valkyrie and the #29 Forestier Racing by Panis ORECA at the Ford Chicane left debris on track. 

Panis leads LMP2 despite drama

The #29 Panis ORECA ended up at the top of the leaderboard despite Rousset’s clash with the Aston LMH and an off-track moment for Esteban Masson in the final hour.

Rousset’s early benchmark of 3m34.252s put him exactly 0.001s ahead of the #30 Duqueine driven by 2019 Macau Grand Prix winner Richard Verschoor.

The two drivers ended up more than two tenths clear of the rest of the LMP2 pack, led by Reshad de Gerus in the #343 Inter Europol.

Aston fastest in LMGT3

Heart of Racing beat WRT to the top spot in the LMGT3 class, with Eduardo Barrichello leading the way in the #23 Aston Martin Vantage GT3.

Clemens Schmid set the initial pace in ASP’s #87 Lexus RC F GT3, taking the top spot with a time of 3m54.115s.

Sean Gelael eclipsed Schmid’s lap at the beginning of the second hour, before Barrichello posted a time of 3m53.996s to end the session on top.

Gelael held on to second in the #32 BMW M4 GT3 despite, with Schmid’s earlier benchmark proving good enough for third place. 

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– The Autosport.com Team