LM24, Hour 17: Toyota retakes the lead after Cadillac penalty

Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA’s stranglehold on the Hypercar class has been relinquished with seven hours left in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, due to a penalty for the leading No. 12 Cadillac V-Series.R.

Louis Delétraz had to come through and serve a drive-through penalty for speeding in a Slow Zone, giving up a 14-second lead for the No. 12 Cadillac which had been comfortably out front since the break of dawn.

This has handed the lead back to the No. 8 Toyota Racing TR010 Hybrid, but not by much, with the No. 20 BMW M Team WRT Hybrid V8 in hot pursuit from second place. Brendon Hartley and Sheldon van der Linde have been locked in a battle for position for most of this current stint, with only a second between them

Delétraz rejoined the race in third place, still well ahead of the No. 7 Toyota (Nyck de Vries) in fourth, then the No. 51 and No. 83 AF Corse Ferrari 499Ps (Alessandro Pier Guidi and Ye Yifei).

Genesis Magma Racing’s debut Le Mans had a few setbacks to this point including recurring electrical problems for the No. 19 which has halted the car’s progress. In contrast the No. 17 GMR-001 had a relatively trouble-free race besides a puncture in the early hours.

But while hovering around the overall top ten, Jaubert clipped the exit kerb at the Dunlop Chicane at just the right angle to snap the right-front suspension and bring the No. 17 Genesis to a halt off the racing line, bringing out a Slow Zone intervention.

The No. 17 car was later brought back to the garage where the manufacturer and team confirmed it had retired from the race.

Doriane Pin has gotten back aboard the No. 30 Duqueine Team ORECA 07-Gibson which still leads LMP2, but the gap has come down from Pin to the two Inter Europol Competition cars.

Tom Dillmann in the No. 43 only trails by a little under 15 seconds, with the No. 343 driven by Nico Müller running a further 34 seconds back in third.

Job van Uitert spun from eighth place in the No. 28 IDEC Sport car, which has since faded from contention for the victory, trailing by a lap.

The No. 4 CrowdStrike Racing by APR ORECA’s trouble-free run has allowed it to dominate LMP2 Pro-Am thus far, leading the No. 183 AF Corse car by a lap.

There’s no stopping the No. 33 TF Sport Chevrolet Corvette Z06 LMGT3.R so far in the GT ranks; Jonny Edgar has brought the gap up to over two minutes over the trailing No. 78 Akkodis ASP Team Lexus of Jack Hawksworth.

Behind Hawksworth, the No. 27 Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin (Zacharie Robichon) runs third, ahead of the No. 74 Kessel Racing Ferrari (Lorenzo Patrese) and the No. 91 Manthey DK Engineering Porsche (Ayhancan Güven).

HOUR 17 RESULTS