Cadillac paced the final official practice session for this weekend’s 24 Hours of Le Mans as Sebastien Bourdais set the fastest time in Thursday night’s running.
After missing out on pole position for the FIA World Endurance Championship blue riband due to a penalty earlier in the evening, the No. 38 Hertz Team JOTA crew led the way in the one-hour session that wrapped up the day’s on-track activities as Bourdais punched in a best lap of 3:26.843 as the checkered flag flew.
That demoted the No. 20 BMW M Hybrid V8 of Robin Frijns to second by a margin of 0.194 seconds, with the Dutchman having leapt to the top of the order on what was the car’s very first flying lap with six minutes left on the clock.
Third-quickest was the No. 7 Toyota TR010 Hybrid of Mike Conway, who had set his best time just before halfway through the session.
Norman Nato was fourth-fastest in the second of the JOTA Cadillac V-Series.Rs, the No. 12 car, ahead of the No. 35 Alpine A424 in which Ferdinand Habsburg set the best time and Phil Hanson in the satellite No. 83 AF Corse Ferrari 499P.
The pole-winning No. 15 BMW was only 15th-fastest.
Pacing LMP2 was the No. 183 AF Corse Oreca 07 Gibson as Ben Barnicoat with a best lap time of 3:36.111, eight thousandths of a second quicker than co-driver Matthieu Vaxiviere had lapped earlier in the session.
Barnicoat’s time was a little under seven tenths clear of the No. 30 Duqueine Team Oreca driven by Peugeot development driver Doriane Pin.
Theodor Jensen made a late jump to third in class aboard the No. 37 CLX Motorsport car, followed by Valerio Rinicella in the No. 28 IDEC Sport entry and Tom Dillmann in the No. 43 Inter Europol Competition Oreca.
Corvettes headed the way in LMGT3 as Jonny Edgar set the class benchmark of 3:55.262 in the No. 33 TF Sport Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R.
Charlie Eastwood was only 0.073 seconds behind in the sister Racing Team Turkey-branded No. 34 entry, while Eduardo Barrichello was best of the rest aboard the No. 23 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo, just over a tenth off the pace.
Track action will resume on Saturday with warm-up at 12 noon local time (6 a.m. EST) before the start of the 24H Le Mans at 4 p.m. (10 a.m. EST).
RESULTS: Free Practice 4
