Aston Martin Racing is leading both GTE classes in the 24 Hours of Le Mans at the eight-hour mark - the #97 Vantage is out in front the GTE Pro class with the #98 GTE Am leading its class and the #95 Vantage following in second place.
Le Mans, 14 June 2014 - Aston Martin Racing is leading both GTE classes in the 24 Hours of Le Mans at the eight-hour mark - the #97 Vantage is out in front the GTE Pro class with the #98 GTE Am leading its class and the #95 Vantage following in second place.
At the four-hour mark, Bruno Senna (BR) took over the Vantage GTE and started a three-hour stint that saw the Brazilian driver pass both works Porsches to hand over to Darren Turner (GB) in second place.
The subsequent battle at the front of the pack saw the Aston Martin exchanging places with the Corvette and Ferrari several times before Turner took the lead and began pulling away. At the eight-hour mark, the #97 leads the GTE Pro race by 14 seconds.
Senna commented: “The car was working well so we could push hard. Darren has done a fantastic job to get into the lead and pull away so much. There’s a long way to go and it is tough out there but we’ll keep pushing and hope for a great result in 16 hours time.”
In the GTE Am class, the #98 Vantage GTE pulled away from the rest of the class to take a one-minute 20-second lead. Christoffer Nygaard (DN) showed his experience and skill to triple stint the Michelin tyres before handing over to team-mate Paul Dalla Lana, who continued to build the lead.
Also impressing with his ability to triple stint the tyres was David Heinemeier Hansson in the #95 Young Driver AMR Vantage GTE. The Dane handed over the car to team-mate Nicki Thiim (DN) in second place who began to close the gap on the leader.
“The changing weather in the first few hours of the race meant we were not quite where we wanted to be, going into the second quarter,” Team Principal John Gaw commented. “However, the drivers have all done a tremendous job to take the lead and pull away. In the Am class, the drivers triple stinted their tyres which gave the cars a fantastic advantage.
“We are now where we wanted to be at this stage in the race, but there is a long way to go and we must stay focused as we race in the darkness.”