Mathieu Jaminet fastest for Porsche in FP3

Mathieu Jaminet put Porsche Penske Motorsport on top in Free Practice 3 ahead of the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Driving the #5 entry from the German-American partnership, Jaminet clocked a 3m24.717s at around 4:10pm local time, having a moment at the Dunlop chicane just seconds later.

This coincidentally happened during a 20-minute evacuation of the circuit’s media centre due to a fire alarm.

Cadillac Jota took second position and third with Earl Bamber (#38) and Will Stevens (#12) in the dying moments of the session, both of them, however, lapping more than eight tenths off the lead Porsche.

Most of the session was led by the #51 Ferrari thanks to a 3m25.705s set by Antonio Giovinazzi on his very first run of the session, but the 499P ended up in fourth after being demoted later in the session.

Further away, the #83 Ferrari, #20 BMW, #4 Porsche, #311 Cadillac and #50 Ferrari all lapped in 3m26s.

Wayne Taylor Racing’s #101 Cadillac spent most of the session in the pits, as a “potential issue” was detected and required an engine swap. With just nine laps covered, it still outpaced three cars in the Hypercar class as teams focused on race pace.

One of these was the #93 Peugeot, which was out of action for half an hour due to a hydraulics failure that impacted the power steering.

“At the start of the session we saw something that we were questioning, so out of caution we decided to change the engine,” Wayne Taylor Racing vice president and general manager Travis Hogue said.

“Typically, that would be a longer change but with the guys we have and the motivation they have to do this race, they did a fantastic job in under two hours to get us back on track.”

The LMP2 class was led by Mathias Beche, setting a 3m36.827s in TDS Racing’s #29 ORECA-Gibson 07, from another Pro/Am entry – Oliver Jarvis in United Autosports’s #23 machine – by six tenths. Inter Europol Competition’s #43 ORECA with Tom Dillmann and the second United Autosports entry driven by Pietro Fittipaldi also lapped less than a second off the leader.

Many incidents involved LMP2 cars over the three hours of practice, with the only red flag caused by AF Corse’s #183 machine crashing at the hands of Francois Perrodo in the Porsche curves.

Jonas Reid hit the wall at Indianapolis, driving the #9 prototype entered by Iron Lynx – Proton, while Aliaksandr Malykhin (CLX – Pure Rxcing) hit a tyre wall with the #37 entry, attempting to take evasive action as the Iron Dames’ #85 car suffered a wobble ahead.

Late in the session, IDEC Sport’s #28 car lost its front-left wheel and trundled back to the pits.

In LMGT3, no fewer than four cars from three different brands went faster than the quickest qualifying time from yesterday. Zacharie Robichon’s #27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin set the pace with a 3m55.897s lap, 0.037s better than Riccardo Pera’s #92 Porsche entered by Manthey.

Akkodis ASP’s #78 Lexus with Jack Hawksworth aboard and Eduardo Barrichello in Racing Spirit of Leman’s #10 Aston followed.

The main incident in this class came from Thomas Flohr, who spun out at the last corner in the #54 Ferrari. 

Photos from 24 Hours of Le Mans – Wednesday