Into the night

With now just the one car circulating with Bell currently at the helm, the 2 car is (touch wood) ok now it’s rear hub and driveshaft has been replaced.

Come 11pm, the order is thus: 97 leads with 107 laps under its belt, followed by 93 that’s 1 lap behind and 87 another 1:44.221 down the road. 76 is on 105 laps, 99 104, 80 +38.090, 85 is +2:29.299 (behind 76). 78 is on 102 laps, 83 on 101, and Bell in 82 has done 98 laps.

At midnight, Bell’s still circulating on a double-stint, but Dean’s getting ready for a double-stint too. He’s comfortably doing consistent 4:13’s but still 10 laps down from the leading Ferrari who’s doing 4:11’s. The circuit’s in pretty good shape at the moment – some drivers even doing their best sector times of the race.

Despite having lost one car, spirits are still high and concentration still paramount now all eyes are on the remaining Panoz Esperante GTLM. There are also quite a few Panoz supporters out in the stands – we really want them to wake from their tents at sunrise to the sound of an Elan Motorsports V8 rumbling away.

Some of them may still be up – there’s still a healthy crowd in the stands visible opposite the pits – thankfully the weather’s stayed dry so far (without tempting fate). Though the air temperature feels low enough to warrant a jacket…

Looking back to this time last year, Dean was just leaving the pits at a little past 1am. He had had the Team’s only unscheduled problem with a broken track rod end that took just 9 minutes to fix and rejoined in 6th place, shortly getting up to 5th.

This year, we’re a little further down the field, and at 1:10am – after things had settled down from Dean pitting for fuel, the order is: 97 (137 laps), 93 (134), 76 (+36.410), 87  (+1:09.031), 99 (133 laps), 85 (131), 78 (129), 83 (127) 82 (126) and 80 is in on a long pit stop on 124 laps, so leapfrogging Dean into 9th place.

Handing the drive back over to Bell for another double stint at 2am, the Le Mans newcomer pops in a 4:14 – 4 seconds ahead of the 83 Ferrari with Matthew Marsh at the wheel, and 6 seconds faster than number 85 Spyker (that’s had a delay in the pits incidentally for bodywork repairs).

The order is still 97 leading ahead of 76, 93, 87, 99, 78, 85, and Bell’s 82 car just over a lap behind GPC Sport’s #83 Ferrari.

“The earlier problem has cost us in terms of time. The rear hub meant a change of drive shaft and lads did a fantastic job; to only lose the 5 or 6 laps we did. We took out all the rear wiring for the wheel speed sensor, traction control and the flat-shift so everything had to be replaced on the left rear.

It’s not quite the trouble-free run we had last year or were expecting. Other than that, the car’s running quite well and making some good progress.”