WEC: Audi celebrates 13th victory at Le Mans
The 24-hour race at Le Mans (France) ended in an Audi one-two victory. In the WEC season’s pinnacle event, Marcel Fässler, André Lotterer and Benoît Tréluyer in the Audi R18 e-tron quattro triumphed in front of their team-mates Lucas di Grassi, Marc Gené and Tom Kristensen. In both Audi R18 e-tron quattro cars clutches from ZF Friedrichshafen AG are used.
Toyota completed the podium. The Japanese automobile manufacturer, whose Technical Partner ZF Friedrichshafen AG is this season, had been leading the race for a long time with the #7 Toyota TS 040-Hybrid, which is equipped with a clutch of the ZF brand. However, the sports car retired with electronic problems after 14 hours. The sister car with Anthony Davidson, Nicolas Lapierre and Sébastien Buemi, in which a ZF clutch is used as well, lost ground early due to an accident but recovered to third place.
A strong debut was shown by the two Porsche 919 Hybrid cars, which are equipped with clutch technology by ZF Friedrichshafen AG. The LMP1 sports car of Timo Bernhard/Brendon Hartley/Mark Webber was leading during parts of the race but in the final stage retired with a defect. The second Porsche – driven by Romain Dumas, Neel Jani, Marc Lieb – demonstrated its performance capabilities as well but lost ground and crossed the finish line on its own strength.
Results, Le Mans (F), round 3, WEC, Jun 14—Jun 15, 2014:
1. Fässler/Lotterer/Tréluyer, Audi, 24h 01m59.830s ZF
2. di Grassi/Gené/Kristensen, Audi, - 3 laps ZF
3. Davidson/Lapierre/Buemi, Toyota, - 5 laps ZF
4. Prost/Heidfeld/Beche, Rebellion-Toyota, - 19 laps
5. Dolan/Tincknell/Turvey, Zytek-Nissan, - 23 laps
6. Thiriet/Badey/Gommendy, Ligier-Nissan, - 24 laps
7. Chatin/Webb/Panciatici, Alpine-Nissan, - 24 laps
8. Capillaire/Rast/Charouz, Oreca-Nissan, - 25 laps
9. Brundle/Mardenborough/Shulzhitskiy, Ligier-Nissan, - 25 laps
10. Klien/Hirsch/Brandela, Morgan-Judd, - 27 laps
Drivers world championship standings:
1. A. Davidson, N. Lapierre and S. Buemi, 80 points each; 4. M. Fässler, A. Lotterer and B. Tréluyer, 60 each; 7. T. Kristensen and L. di Grassi, 54 each; 9. M. Beche, N. Prost and N. Heidfeld, 42 each.
Constructors world championship standings:
1. Toyota, 115 points; 2. Audi, 114; 3. Porsche, 60.