(WEC)
2023 24 Hours of Le Mans Provisional Results (PDF)
Ferrari is back. After an absence of half a century the Ferrari 499P Hypercar scored the win in the Centenary year of 24 Hours of Le Mans in front of a sell-out crowd of 325,000 people Sunday.
It was the Italian manufacturer’s first appearance in the top class at Le Mans since 1973 and marked Ferrari’s first overall victory since 1965. The winning trio of Antonio Giovinazzi, James Calado and Alessandro Pier Guidi secured 50 FIA WEC championship points and sees Ferrari close on Toyota with just 18 points separating the two manufacturers with three rounds in the WEC season remaining.
It was not all smooth sailing for Ferrari, however, as a close battle played out between the No. 8 Toyota Gazoo Racing GR010 Hybrid Hypercar until Ryo Hirakawa spun when braking at Arnage, causing front and rear car damage. A pitstop to fit new bodywork saw the Japanese driver rejoin the race but a lap behind the Ferrari.
There was even more drama when Pier Guidi was unable to restart the No. 51 Hypercar after a routine pit stop and lost crucial seconds in the pits. The team breathed a sigh of relief as Pier Guidi restarted the engine after about 30 seconds and eventually crossed the checkered flag 1:27 seconds ahead of Hirakawa, Brendon Hartley and Sebastien Buemi who claimed the runners-up spot.
“When you are a kid and you are a racing driver, you have a few races that you watch all the time,” Giovinazzi said. “It’s 24 Hours of Le Mans, Indianapolis and then, of course for me it was Monza F1 and so it was one of my dreams. Today the dream came true.”
Calado and Pier Guidi add the overall Hypercar triumph to their 2019 and 2021 LMGTE Pro wins, while Giovinazzi becomes the first driver since Fernando Alonso in 2018 to win Le Mans on his first attempt.
Cadillac Racing clinched a third and fourth place finish as the No.2 Cadillac V-Series R driven by Alex Lynn, Earl Bamber and Richard Westbrook crewed home the No.2 car of Renger van der Zande, Sebastien Bourdais and Scott Dixon. Three different manufacturers – Ferrari, Toyota and Cadillac – on today’s podium is the first in the top class of Le Mans since 2016. The No. 50 Ferrari 499P Hypercar, driven by Nicklas Nielsen, Antonio Fuoco and Miguel Molina rounded out the top five.
Meanwhile, Glickenhaus Racing maintained their 100% finishing record at Le Mans with the No.708 and No.709 Glickenhaus 007 Hypercars claiming sixth and seventh position. Both cars went off at Indianapolis at different stages of the race and subsequently spent time in the pits for repairs.
The highest Peugeot TotalEnergies 9X8 finisher was the No.93 car of Paul di Resta, Jean-Eric Vergne and Mikkel Jensen in eighth place. The French manufacturer was leading Le Mans earlier in the race with the sister No. 94 car but dropped out of podium contention when Gustavo Menezes crashed in the middle of the night at first Mulsanne chicane. Both cars spent time in the garage with reported hydraulic issues and the No. 94 car classified 12th.
Porsche Penske Motorsport had a difficult race, the squad leading the race at one point but going on to suffer from a series of misfortunes including a retirement for the No. 75 Porsche 963 with a fuel pressure problem. The WEC entered No. 6 Porsche 963 crashed at Porsche Curves with Kevin Estre at the wheel and then suffered further time loss due to a battery problem. The sister No. 5 car was in contention for a top five place until a broken driveshaft in the race’s closing hour dropped the car to ninth.
The final classified finisher in Hypercar was the Hertz Team JOTA Porsche 963 which took a distant 13th after spending most of final hours in the pits.
The No. 7 Toyota Gazoo Racing Hypercar retired early on as Kamui Kobayashi was involved in an accident with two LMP2 cars and a LMGTE Am car on the approach to Tertre Rouge. Elsewhere, the No. 4 Floyd Vanwall Racing Team retired after completing 165 laps. Tristan Vautier was at the wheel when the Vanwall Vandervell stopped on track with smoke visible from the rear.
In LMP2 Inter Europol Competition scored a highly popular debut WEC victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans as Jakub Śmiechowski, Fabio Scherer and Albert Costa took the win.
The team had claimed their first ever WEC podium at Spa last month and used that momentum to enjoy an impressive race where they made few mistakes, came through the pack and led for most of the race from dawn onwards.
Both Costa and Scherer came under intense pressure in the final few hours from the No.41 Team WRT Oreca-Gibson as first Robert Kubica and then Louis Deletraz chipped away at the gap to the yellow and green car.
Deletraz indeed came to within eight seconds in the final hour before Scherer dug deep and was able to repel the attack.
Swiss ace Scherer even fought off the pain of a bizarre injury he sustained when the No.33 Corvette Racing car inadvertently ran over his left foot during a round of pitstops in the first hour.
At that stage Scherer believed his Le Mans to be over but he fought on and cemented his, and his teammates drives, instantly gained a legendary cult status.
The team even held its nerves during several investigations in to pit stops to come home 21-seconds ahead of the WRT entry driven by Kubica, Deletraz and Rui Andrade.
In winning, Inter Europol Competition became the first Polish team to win in the WEC and thrust into title contention for the rest of the 2023 season.
Completing the podium was the first of the incoming ELMs as the Duqueine Racing trio of Neel Jani, Rene Binder and Nicolas Pino took the French teams best ever Le Mans result in LMP2 at Le Mans.
Jani has led the race in the early morning period and the team capitalized in the final hour when the second No.31 Team WRT entry driven by Robin Frijns, Ferdinand Habsburg and Sean Gelael had to pit for a new front bodywork section.
That dropped Frijns down to a frustrated fifth at the checkered flag behind the No.36 Alpine ELF Team trio of Charles Milesi, Julien Canal and Matthieu Vaxiviere.
The FIA WEC will move to Italy next for round five of the championship – the 6 Hours of Monza – which takes place in one month’s time (7 – 9 July).
Greg has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.