The opening laps of the race saw Toyota in positions 1 and 2 until the chasing Audi hybrids pressured the fast and furios TS040 Hybrid race cars of Alex Wurz (No.7) and Nicolas Lapierre (No.8). The sheer speed of the Toyota’s saw them into lapped traffic at the end of the third lap of this 13km road circuit.
Rain fell at the beginning of the second hour, and the crashes began. Racing on slick tyres, the field found visibility cut dramatically as they sliced through the heavy rain storms that were falling on parts of the circuit. Benoit Treluyer came up to second in the #2 Audi R18 e-tron quattro, while Hartley briefly lost third to the #1 Audi of Lucas di Grassi – which passed the Porsche with ease on the start-finish straight before pitting shortly afterwards.
At the 6th hour, Toyota is still leading the race with Stefane Sarrazin in the leading No.7 car. Sarrazin had edged the leading TS040 HYBRID’s advantage up to one minute over the No.2 Audi R18 e-tron quattro of Benoit Treluyer, but that was reduced by around 25 seconds when Toyota decided against that strategy, instead putting on fresh tyres as Kazuki Nakajima took over from Sarrazin towards the end of the hour.
By the 9th hour the field of cars seesAlex Wurz leading the dominant #7 Toyota he shares with Stephane Sarrazin and Kazuki Nakajima who has barely looked troubled as he became mister consistent and just kept putting in trouble free laps. Behind are the pair of Audiswith #2 of Fassler/Lotterer/Treluyer sitting around 1min45sec behind the Austrian with Marc Genesitting a lap down in third place in the #1.
The Porsches are holding safe in fourth and fifth but both cars have become sloppy at points with both cars going straight on at Arnage at different points of the hour.
2014 24 Hours of Le Mans class standings after 9 hours
LMP1
1 – #7 Toyota Racing – Wurz/Sarrazin/Nakajima
2 – #2 Audi Sport Team Joest – Fassler/Lotterer/Treluyer
3 – #1 Audi Sport Team Joest – di Grassi/Gene/Kristensen
LMP2
1 – #35 Oak Racing – Brundle/Mardenborough/Shulzhitskiy
2 – #36 Signatech Alpine– Panciatici/Webb/Chatin
3 – #34 Race Performance – Frey/Mailleux/Lancaster
LMGTE Pro
1 – #97 Aston Martin Racing – Turner/Mücke/Senna
2 – #74 Corvette Racing – Gavin/Milner/Westbrook
3 – #51 AF Corse – Bruni/Vilander/Fisichella
LMGTE Am
1 – #98 Aston Martin Racing – Dalla Lana/Lamy/Nygaard
2 – #95 Aston Martin Racing – Poulson/Heinemeier Hansson/Thiim
3 – #72 SMP Racing – Bertolini/Shaitar/Basov
