Vaxiviere apologizes for Le Mans crash

Matthieu Vaxiviere has apologized to Risi Competizione and driver Pierre Kaffer for causing the crash that put the Houston-based team's No.82 Ferrari 488 GTE out of last weekend's 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Vaxiviere, who was making his Le Mans debut in an LMP2 ORECA run by TDS Racing, was passing the slower Ferrari on the Mulsanne Straight five hours into the race but moved back across to reclaim his line too early, sideswiping the Ferrari and sending it spinning into the wall.

The 22-year-old Frenchman, who was heavily criticized in the aftermath for causing an avoidable accident, issued a statement on Wednesday:

"Further to the different posts I have read on the internet after the accident I had at Le Mans, I must be humble toward my motorsport family and my fans.

"My first concern is to apologize again to Pierre Kaffer and to the team Risi Competizione, which I did personally after the race. I know I did wrong and I am sorry about this, and to be honest when I passed Pierre I really thought I was ahead of the Ferrari when I came back in my racing line. I misjudged the action and be sure I did not do that on purpose.

"I can understand the great disappointment for the team and the fans, and again I apologize from the bottom of my heart, and my first concern when I saw the video was to have medical news [about] Pierre, [whom] I found out was doing OK, and that's the most important [thing] now.

"I have learned from this mistake, and now I will go on with our team work to pursue my race career. Of course these kinds of accidents are really bad, but unfortunately I am not the only one to whom this has happened. My goal us to not do that ever again."

Vaxiviere's apology was swiftly accepted by Kaffer via Twitter:

"Thank you Matthieu as I wrote u already I accept your apologize [sic]. You pay [for] the coffee."

The TDS team was issued a seven-minute stop-and-go penalty for the incident, and the car subsequently crashed out of the race towards the end of hour 15 when Emmanuel Collard lost control in the exit of the Porsche Curves.