2019 24 Hours of LeMans

LMP1: Heartbreak for the #7 car that deserved to win but racing does not work like that. You take your luck when you get it because motor racing hands out its fair share of bad breaks. The #8 Toyota stayed in striking distance to take advantage so the win is rightfully theirs.

LMP2: Brilliant battle between the Alpine and G-Drive teams parked next to one another and pitting at the same time for hours on end. A brilliant display and the Alpine team did a wonderful job to win.

GTE Pro: Popular win here and well deserved. The Astons had a miserable race, The Corvettes not much better and the factory Porsche and Ford GT's got flat out beaten by a semi-works team in AF Corse. Great job.

GTE Am: Brilliant performance by the privateer Ford GT effort and an amazingly close finish. It was a popular victory and I thought the purple retro livery was pretty nice. Great seeing it cross the finish line in first.

 

Other race broadcasts will show the logo of the car next to the drivers names. I kept having to refer back to the spotters guide to figure out what car was what. Part of my problem is I follow IMSA very closely and so for any car number I can tell you what the car is, and who the drivers are. Everything was different for Le Mans so I was very confused for much of it.

I watched the majority of the race and to be honest, I just didn't find it all that exciting. Part of it was that didn't really care for the Eurosports announcers and that Studio24 segment the kept doing was terrible. Should have streamed RLM instead.

 

The problem with RLM was their audio was about a minute ahead of the video that was coming across
on the Motor Trend live stream. So, it was kind of disconcerting.

Tom K sure is getting better at operating that big video board to explain what was going on. In the opinion
of many, he could still be racing but he decided it was time to stop.

BHW

 

I didn't mind TK, I would have just preferred for that to have been part of the regular commentary instead of a 20min segment every 2 hours.

 

I always liked Ben Keating as the epitome of the gentleman owner-driver. It was good to see him win GTE-Am, even if it came at Ferrari's expense.

 

Yeah, they've been doing it that way for a couple of years now.

I think it's down to Tom having other obligations with the ACO and Rolex during race
week.

BHW

 

Keating's GTE-Am win taken away due to minimum refueling time violation.

55 second penalty added, drops them to 4th.

 

It is amazing how frequently they have these post race penalties. No one wants to see this. Perhaps minimum refueling times aren't the answer...

The sport is so over regulated and balanced it is getting hard to watch. Too many things outside of the car/team/driver performance are dictating the outcome of races.

 

Both best placed fords disqualified while Ferrari wins Gte pro. Wonder if they’ll make a film about that...

 

Now it looks like they are being excluded completely.

https://racer.com/2019/06/17/le-mans-gte-am-winning-no-85-ford-disqualified/?fbclid=IwAR2biwpn7NFmCUBtuoSzT5rm8LeEhUCylKAG6pdIYQRPjBmXu9GZNYHOrTI

 

Bravo well done, congrets to AF and the Competizioni Team


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I believe I covered this earlier in the thread. Politics and money. It's going to kill the sport. Another day in paradise.

 

yeah, don't know if that was a miscommunication or the ACO doubling down on stupid.

 

Ford isn't returning to WEC and both top finishing GTs are penalized. If this kind of political **** didn't happen every single year at this race you'd think it was odd.

 

And this why spec racing is a farce. One rule gets stretched and the kids in charge have a cow. When in reality the rule wasn't clear to begin with. And you want owners to spend how much on this nonsense ? Time to rethink this rules thing and as stated earlier, allow ALL competitors a say in ths rule making process. Taking wins away after the fact only harms the sport further.

 

I am torn on this. The rules are the rules and they broke them. Keating isn't going to appeal the penalty and admitted their calculations were off. It sucks. It isn't good for anyone involved (except maybe that teams that get promoted up a position). I would love for them to be able to asses some of these penalties in the race, not after. As a fan I feel like I wasted a lot of time watching the race, since the results are now being changed from what I saw.

 

Some really good insight from Marshall Pruett and Graham Goodwin on their Week in Sportscars podcast. Lots of good insight, opinion and timing on the disqualifications.

https://marshallpruett.podbean.com/e/mp-599-the-week-in-sports-cars-june-18-with-graham-goodwin/

 

Yup, the Ben Keating one get's stranger and stranger. First, they got called in to change the nose for damage, even though the damage was covered with race tape and there were other cars out there with more damage. Then they get called back in again for excessive wheel spin. Then after the race, they got the 55.2 second penalty for too fast refueling, then finally the complete disqualification for being over fuel capacity by less than 100ml. Taken that way, it sure sounds like someone was out to exclude the car at all costs. Now MP put a different spin on it. The in race penalties could have been applied to try and get the car off the podium to avoid the embarrassment of the post race penalties.

 

Certainly an interesting theory. If you think back to the Daytona 24 in 2018 and the penalty for Land Motorsports for their refueling issue, that was noticed mid race, and a penalty applied, and the team was allowed to try to correct their actions and make that time back up. The articles I have read about the #85 mention the quick pit stop, but don't mention if it was every stop, just one or when it was noticed. It would be nice if some of these issues can be discovered before the race, or at least during it, so that when the race is over, we are confident that who we saw win, is who won.

 

Don't forget that the team that owns the car that was promoted to first place committed to running a two car team in the WEC recently:

https://sportscar365.com/lemans/wec/project-1-set-for-two-car-porsche-program-next-season/

 

My understanding is the winning Ferrari team in GTE will also be disqualified due to the fact that the underwear of two drivers was not of the correct red color of the French flag. A stop and go penalty would have been imposed but the infraction was not found until post race inspection.

Sorry guys but the rules have to be enforced!

 

Anyone know what shade of Rosso car 51 is this year? Sure looks good.

 

According to this it's to pay homage to the 125S and looks to be the same since 2017 to me: https://sportscar365.com/lemans/wec/new-color-for-af-corse-ferraris/

Reminds me of Rosso Barchetta.

Edit: Maybe Rosso Mugello as it looks metallic.

Edit #2: Rosso Monza is my final guess as I don't think Barchetta or Muegello are suppose to be metallic.

 

Couldn't they have checked that BEFORE the race ?

I don't think FORD increased the fuel tank capacity during the race.