[LM24 Race] 2015 24 Hours of Le Mans

[Salamus]

Did they ever put the softer tire on the #8 to test it out? Seems like that would have been the logical thing to do.

[JHamilton]

Wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

[Victor_RO]

Originally Posted by JHamilton

Wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Hands-down the best victory celebration too. Blasts from the train horn and a proper burnout after the slowing-down lap.

[fieldodreams79]

Originally Posted by Victor_RO

Hands-down the best victory celebration too. Blasts from the train horn and a proper burnout after the slowing-down lap.

Originally Posted by JHamilton

Wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Bowties, 'merica, etc.

Awesome win and one that I won't forget.

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by Articus

from what I gathered, despite how thorough we know Audi to be, there was a bit of tyre testing they did not get to. During the night they were slower because they were running the daytime tire which they knew they could quadruple stint. RLM said they had no idea if the softer tires Michelin supplied for colder temperatures could be quadruple stinted. However given what we know of Audi, I would think the reality is they knew they could not quadruple stint a softer tire.

Why not try it on the 3rd car?

Seems an opportunity lost perhaps

[gwyllion]

Originally Posted by GTRMagic

Why not try it on the 3rd car?

Seems an opportunity lost perhaps

Audi #9 was really in contention for the victory at that point. Only Audi #8 was a bit back, but not enough to throw away their chances of a podium?

[ederss7]

Weird to see the old and bullet proof 911 with lot of issues, two of them on fire(within 1h into the race) and the other factory car spending so many time in the garage while the new 919 has a flat out race with incredible pace without having a single technical problem.

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by ederss7

Weird to see the old and bullet proof 911 with lot of issues, two of them on fire(within 1h into the race) and the other factory car spending so many time in the garage while the new 919 has a flat out race with incredible pace without having a single technical problem.

Were they the new 991 911 RSRs or the 997 version?

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by gwyllion

Audi #9 was really in contention for the victory at that point. Only Audi #8 was a bit back, but not enough to throw away their chances of a podium?

I hear you, but if you have 3 cars operating on the same strategy, and the competitor is beating you on pace in & out of the pits, surely in the big box of strategic options, a change would be considered good to explore.

As Toyota discovered, there is no glory in banging around the back end of the top 10 of the LMP1 class.

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by bjohnsonsmith

IIRC, what they were saying at the time on Radio Le Mans was Porsche were able to refuel their cars quicker than Audi, knocking a good 5 seconds of their stops. This either enabled Porsche to retain the lead and or sometimes undercut Audi.

Watching the Thunderbirds this morning... (yes, Supermarionation Rocks!) I was wondering why a team didnt do away with the whole refuelling caper completely.

Imagine having a removable pod for fuel, a carbon fibre enclosure with filler bag, full pump & pick up system aboard... that just 'plugs in' to the car, after replacing an empty one.

It would likely to be quicker to change, and stop volumes of fuel flowing on the pit lane...

I recall the Audis some years ago developing an almost clip-in gearbox for their WEC machines.. its not too different to that concept, only with fuel...

[TzeiTzei]

Originally Posted by bjohnsonsmith

IIRC, what they were saying at the time on Radio Le Mans was Porsche were able to refuel their cars quicker than Audi, knocking a good 5 seconds of their stops. This either enabled Porsche to retain the lead and or sometimes undercut Audi.

Porsche cant use as much fuel as Audi on lap so to achieve the same stint length they dont need as much fuel in the tank. Atleast that is what I think. Are the refuelling speeds such that it takes the same time for petrol and diesel to put the same amount of energy in to the tank?

[Akrapovic]

5 seconds is a lot of fuel isn't it? That doesn't sound like saving half a laps worth. That sounds like the filling speed needs looked at.

[GTRMagic]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

5 seconds is a lot of fuel isn't it? That doesn't sound like saving half a laps worth. That sounds like the filling speed needs looked at.

Perhaps diesel doesnt flow as well as petrol?

[Mike Harte]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

5 seconds is a lot of fuel isn't it? That doesn't sound like saving half a laps worth. That sounds like the filling speed needs looked at.

This was discussed on Eurosport yesterday, and it would seem as though the flow rates for the two fuels are different, the diesel being the slower, but that was mandated by the regulations. Might it be something to do with the equivalency rules for the two types of engines?

[ederss7]

Originally Posted by GTRMagic

Were they the new 991 911 RSRs or the 997 version?

One factory 911 retired after 1 hour with the car on fire, then one from GTE-AM had similar failure. The other factory car had the gearbox leaking fluid and other issues. .

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by GTRMagic

Perhaps diesel doesnt flow as well as petrol?

The diesel flow rate is lowered by the regulations, otherwise Audi would have much faster stops. The diesel has a smaller fuel tank too, so the fact they can go a less laps at times, and have longer stops makes you wonder if it's properly balanced.


However no nobody can complain the diesels have too much of an advantage. Finally a petrol team won through being better than Audi. For too long people said Audi won because of the rules, when in reality they were the best. Porsche has proven petrol can and will win when you're good enough.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by TzeiTzei

Porsche cant use as much fuel as Audi on lap so to achieve the same stint length they dont need as much fuel in the tank. Atleast that is what I think. Are the refuelling speeds such that it takes the same time for petrol and diesel to put the same amount of energy in to the tank?

The density of diesel is about 0.832 kg/L, which is roughly 11.6% more than ethanol-free petrol/gasoline, which has a density of about 0.745 kg/L, so that may account for the different refueling speeds.

IIRC it was during the pistops, when Brendon Hartley and André Lotterer were both battling it out, RLM commented on Porsche's quicker refueling speed. Hartley came in for a fuel stop and the RLM commentators thought he would lose the lead but he came out still ahead.

[PascaLM]

Audi falls a second time in 16 years (I don't mention Bentley, it's another discussion). That was a great race, with a pulverised lap record. And as far as I can remember, it's the first time that all the cars of favourite official teams don't have big issues and reach the finish. The new regulation bring high performances, new technologies and reliability.
The preparation of the cars has been perfect, in all categories, although misfortune stroke some (Aston Martin in particular).
A great vintage.

[Bandicoot17]

Originally Posted by bjohnsonsmith

IIRC it was during the pistops, when Brendon Hartley and André Lotterer were both battling it out, RLM commented on Porsche's quicker refueling speed. Hartley came in for a fuel stop and the RLM commentators thought he would lose the lead but he came out still ahead.

Porsche were apparently doing 13 lap stints though?? Pretty sure they should be able to do 14, so they were putting less fuel in the tank, which saves time.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by Bandicoot17

Porsche were apparently doing 13 lap stints though?? Pretty sure they should be able to do 14, so they were putting less fuel in the tank, which saves time.

I think you're right, they were doing 13 lap stints but whatever they were doing it payed off as they spent less time pitting and that's what gave them the edge over Audi, before the race went into the night time phase.

[wolfhound]

To the best of my knowledge the rules first balance the energy density of the different fuels. They then make the fuel tanks have a max of the same amount of energy. The same principle applies to the fuel flow rates when filling the tanks. As Porsche are running in the 8MJ category they are they are not allowed as much fuel flow for the engine and therefore require less at the pit stops. It is this that allows them to have faster pit stops.

[bjohnsonsmith]

Originally Posted by wolfhound

To the best of my knowledge the rules first balance the energy density of the different fuels. They then make the fuel tanks have a max of the same amount of energy. The same principle applies to the fuel flow rates when filling the tanks. As Porsche are running in the 8MJ category they are they are not allowed as much fuel flow for the engine and therefore require less at the pit stops. It is this that allows them to have faster pit stops.

Thanks for the explanation and they took full advantage of the situation and I think, that's basically what won them the race.

[greeny12]

At the end of the day audi proved the old adage that being on the ragged edge to compete is not a recipe for success at La Sarthe. They got away with it at both the early WEC races, where the six-hour format did not provide sufficient opportunity for the hyper-aggressive driving and risky overtakes to get punished... but over 24 hours it's a different story.

I remember saying to my mate as we watched the early action that at some point one of Lotterer's banzai efforts would end in tears and so it proved. Same could be argued of the #8 crash, where it looked from the on-board like the red mist of "overtake, overtake, overtake!" had descended. They were very, very lucky boys to still be running after that, let alone in contention for a podium.

Absolutely delighted that Porsche won, it's exactly what Le Mans needed - the race's champion constructor back where it truly belongs.

Roll on 2016!

[wewantourdarbyback]

Originally Posted by greeny12

At the end of the day audi proved the old adage that being on the ragged edge to compete is not a recipe for success at La Sarthe. They got away with it at both the early WEC races, where the six-hour format did not provide sufficient opportunity for the hyper-aggressive driving and risky overtakes to get punished... but over 24 hours it's a different story.

I remember saying to my mate as we watched the early action that at some point one of Lotterer's banzai efforts would end in tears and so it proved. Same could be argued of the #8 crash, where it looked from the on-board like the red mist of "overtake, overtake, overtake!" had descended. They were very, very lucky boys to still be running after that, let alone in contention for a podium.

Absolutely delighted that Porsche won, it's exactly what Le Mans needed - the race's champion constructor back where it truly belongs.

Roll on 2016!

There's picture on Loic's twitter feed of the #8 crash which shows the green flags waving, he came across the cars unsighted in the middle of the road, I think your comment is rather unfair as he did a great job avoiding an almighty shunt.

As for 'aggressve driving and risky overtakes' I could easily point you to Brendan Hartley driving through a marshal post at Spa, or a couple of moments where a Porsche dodged close in this race between lapped traffic, they all did it, they all took the same risks.

As for saying Lotterer's efforts ended in tears, he wasn't involved in any incident...

[Simmi]

Does anyone know on which lap of the race Lotterer banged in that fastest lap?

Alkamel only lists what lap in the car it was for Andre (116). Not sure why it does that.