Latino Sports Network
Le Mans, 20 June 2013 – Aston Martin Racing topped both the timing tables in the first qualifying session of the 24 Hours of Le Mans last night. The #99 Vantage GTE, driven by Frenchman Frédéric Makowiecki, put in a 3:55.658 to go fastest overall and, in the GTE Am class, the #95 was the quickest of the nighttime session.
Despite the extra ballast given to all five of the Vantage GTEs following solid performances in the official Le Mans test session 10 days ago, each of the cars pushed hard to record fast times.
With little under an hour remaining, the session was red-flagged due to an irreparable damage to barrier caused by an incident.
Aston Martin Racing Team Principal John Gaw comments: “The team finally got out on track for the first running of a busy week and going fastest in both GT classes is certainly a good way to start our Le Mans campaign. The four-hour practice session earlier in the day allowed us to get the cars well prepared and our drivers put in some solid laps in the qualifying session despite the disruptions caused by red flags and the mixed conditions on track. The plan is to keep pushing and get the best possible qualifying results for all of our cars as well as setting them up to make them easy to drive in the race.”
The five Aston Martin Vantage GTEs will next head out onto the track at 1900hrs today for the second qualifying session of the week.
GTE Pro cars:
#97 Darren Turner (GB), Stefan Mücke (D) and Peter Dumbreck (GB)
#98 Pedro Lamy (PT), Paul Dalla Lana (CN) and Bill Auberlen (USA)
#99 Bruno Senna (BR), Fred Makowiecki (FR) and Rob Bell (GB)
GTE Am cars:
#95 Allan Simonsen (DN), Kristian Poulsen (DN) and Christoffer Nygaard (DN)
#96 Jamie Campbell-Walter (GB), Stuart Hall (GB) and Roald Goethe (D)