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Hello everyone and welcome to RaceFans Live for the opening round of the 2018-19 World Endurance Championship, the Six Hours of Spa!
Where can we watch the live stream?
Quest has it on British TV from now until 6 am and from 10 am until race end… …but only on actual TVs (Freeview Channel 12). For legal reasons, you can’t use its internet channel for it.
Keith is WEC on TV in the UK
I’m in the UK and watching on the Eurosport app, alternatively you can subscribe to the WEC app (not sure how much it costs) and get live streaming and timing there. I am not aware of any TV stations broadcasting live footage.
fiawec.com site seems to be down “internal 500 error” in San Diego California.
Same for me, from Berlin, Germany. Bummer,my neighbour in hospital room got a TV pass, had WEC on earlier, but now he’s away for a procedure, so no video :/
The site is back up and running.
It’s on MotorTrend HD (Spectrum ch 97) here in La.
Looks like they’re covering the whole race.(Fingers crossed)
Don’t think I’ve heard any of the commentators before but they seem to be doing a fine job so far.
@ Live Timing. (Hopefully around the world?)
https://www.lemans.org/en/24-hours-of-le-mans/live-timing
Oh ! Should have looked at the dates…
LE Mans, Now!
I am watching live on Youtube.
Hmm, well fingers crossed, On the West Coast it’s listed at 9.39 am on the ‘Velocity Channel’.
…which is working!… a while back I checked, (even though I’m paying for a billion channels..funny how that works!) it was a ‘pay channel’.
Frustrating that i cant watch the full race live here in US. Only bits and pieces on a channel nobody ever has heard of. Nothing on their website either. And one the WEC site their pass does not work over here apparently.
Has it started yet?
Alonso won !
#:) I am always happy to see Fernando win, and he has some track to make up thanx to Buemi`s first stint!!! How far is he behind Conway now?! Im going to cricfree.tv to find out.
Lol awesome race.
Thanks for joining in guys, sorry I couldn’t join you today, here’s the race report:
https://www.racefans.net/2018/05/05/alonso-wins-on-wec-debut-with-buemi-and-nakajima/
More to come in Weekend Racing Wrap on Monday.
Thank you for the invitation. Laptop on Radio Le Mans, desktop on F1 Fanatic/Twitter/live timing/Fisico Fan Base/miscellaneous site duty, snacks and water ready for consumption, AF Corse T-shirt on… …ready for the race :)
Hopefully Rafa won’t start the race a lap too early.
Formation lap! (And it looks like Rafael’s starting on the right lap)
Start!
Geez, that was pretty un-Lotterer-like…
@JackySteeg …quite.
I’m happy with Fisico’s progress so far (he’s now 3rd in GTE-Am), the AF Corse performances on start were a mixed bag, and I still don’t know how Manor is doing as I’m trying to get a live timing to load.
Manors are 6th and 10th in LMP2. Could be worse, but could be better.
The second Manor is dropping like a stone sadly. Falling behind more LMP2s each lap.
Rain starting to fall in the pits, apparently.
The #5 Manor/TRSM appears to have a puncture.
A Porsche 911 with pace is going to be very difficult to beat.
Was rooting for one of the rival LMP1s to get ahead of Toyota on the Mulsanne at the start, so a bit frustrated by the rather crummy move by. the Rebellion
If Toyota wanted to ensure a win I can’t help but feel they should have added a third car.
@KeithCollantine Me too. LMP2s due to start stopping next lap.
Giancarlo Fisichella is now leading GTE-Am. I am a happy fan :D
Lots of organised chaos in the GTE-Ams. It seems all pitting simultaneously isn’t the optimal move for some of them.
Look out for gravel at Porsche after Bleekemolen (who was 5th in GTE-Am) spun in it.
Problem for the number six Brundle/Rowland/Turvey car.
One hour in the Alonso/Buemi/Nakajima leads overall ahead of the sister car of Kobayashi/Conway/Lopez, 15 seconds between them. The Sarrazin/Orudzhev/Isaakyan SMP car leads the competition but already over a minute behind. Vergne/Rusinov/Pizzitola lead LMP2 for G-Drive and the pink number 92 Porsche of Estre/Christensen/Vanthoor is leading GTE-Pro. Very light rain falling in the pits.
Heavy rain in the pits!
And now we have the leaders in pits and a rear wing change – a reaction to the growing rainfall?
@keithcollantine That seems quite likely to me, and it’s also a handy way of removing the damage it got on the first lap.
The Maldonado car has a wheel problem and he hasn’t even got in it yet…
Fisichella is about to retake the lead of GTE-Am as the #86 Barker that was leading it has pitted oddly early (8 laps into its stint).
A change for third place in the Dunlop curves, the Laurent/Beche/Menezes Rebellion demotes the the Sarrazin/Orudzhev/Isaakyan SMP car.
Been away for half an hour, what’s happened to the #11 SNP car?
@zazeems The #11 SMP has been in the pits for the last 10 laps for engine problems.
Physically speaking, this is a paradox.
@nase Not really – the leaders have done 10 laps while the #11 has been stuck in the pits, presumably with steam coming out of Button’s ears.
I know, I know.
Just poking fun at the fact that travelling a distance (10 laps) while being stationary sounds impossible. ^^
Thanks for the info! Rotten luck.
It’s a good job Jackie Chan DC Racing have strength in numbers in the LMP2 class because the number 38 Tung/Richelmi/Aubry car has hit trouble now with a puncture.
The #86 Barker (Barker P58, last GTE-Am) has crashed into the barrier at the Porsche Curves. The #38 Chan (Tung P14, 8th LMP2) has a puncture. It is unclear if these are related.
Thunderstorm coming…
Not according to this precipitation radar. Nothing to come from the south-west for the next few hours.
The whole track is now green for the first time in a while. Meanwhile, the GTE-Am leader is losing time hand over fist, largely because he is Thomas Flohr, a Bronze driver, up against a solid Silver called Cooper MacNeil…
Hello, my fellow hard rockin’, pedal-to-the-metal pressin’, fire spittin’, motorsport geeks!
I totally forgot about the race! :(:(((( Anything important that I have missed??
How could you forget?! Toyota running trouble free so far, swapping positions up front. A couple of the other LMP1s collided at the first corner. Button’s car spent about 2 hours in the pits. Manors having a bad time. ByKolles car had biggest accident of the day. GTE-Pro is where all the action is at. Think that’s the main points covered….
Hello, Damon!
This race has been fairly quiet so far. The #4 ByKolles surprised us by going nearly 5 hours before breaking down. It still managed to be the first retirement of the race.
The #98 Aston Martin and #86 Porsche have both had heavy crashes. The #98 got back to the pits, though.
Button’s car, the #11 SMP, has had major engine problems and lost over 40 laps, but is also still running. Maldonado has kept it clean all race so far. Unlike Montoya who… …crashed at Indianapolis.
The Alonso hype train is still on the tracks as his car is leading.
Laurens Vanthoor has been warned for exceeding track limits repeatedly. The irony in that is one of the many little things that keep me amused.
I am suspicious of how quiet things are in the race right now.
Le Mans is the best. My favorite by far.
Love the retro Rothmans Porsche colors, always rooted for Stuck, Bell and Holbert’s 962.
@Some of these cars sound real sweet..
I must admit I didn’t originally recognise that for what it’s supposed to be. I think there might not be enough gold in it or something.
Ditto, and that’s one of my favourite liveries of all time. Prefer the look of the ‘pink pig’ car to be honest. Looks exactly like the original.
They should have done a retro hippie car.
Curious: Another rear wing change for the number eight Toyota. Reverting the original swap?
I have to say the television direction has left a lot to be desired at times. Keep seeing notifications of yellow flags then no indication of what the cause is.
In this case it’s the #47 Villorba, so this is the first F1 driver of the race to crash (Felipe Nasr was at the wheel at the time – cause unknown).
If I’m Ford I ask myself why I spend hundreds of millions developing the Ford GT supercar only to have the ACO make a BMW limousine as fast or faster.
Now that was team Porsche blocking!
C’mon Seb…
Noticed no. 7 is now leading, has no. 8 pitted?
seem so… but i didnt saw it in tv for some reason.. i mean nor i missed it or they didnt show it
is moves for blocking permited in wec?
Yes, within reason and if both cars are on the same lap. Going off-track in the process, on the other hand…
That’s a shame. One of the stronger performances we’ve seen from the #4. Seems like it’s their destiny to be the first official retirement.
The #71 AF Corse (Bird, P39, 10th GTE-Pro) is in the pits for damage checks.
3 cars getting penalties for overtaking under the Safety Car. I had no idea that rule was so hard to follow.
BMW sedan passes a Ferrari F-488. I look forward to Hyundai entering GTE Pro
That could be fun :) (There’s no “minimum prestige” rule in GT Racing, so if someone felt like entering an uprated Daewoo or Datsun, there would be no objection.
The difficulty is at what point prestige super car brands such as Corvette, Ferrari, Aston Martin, Ford GT view being beaten by more plebeian vehicles as a detriment to their branding objectives.
#10 Dragonspeed (van der Zande, P7, 6th LMP1) just took an interesting line across the gravel run-off…
#5 Manor/TRSM is headed for the pits again. This is not the weekend Manor wanted, alas.
…and the #5 decides it doesn’t need to any more. Meanwhile, an LMP2 has spun but I missed which.
It looks like the #8 Toyota may have reversed on its last pitstop – an excludable offence.
The Toyota has clarified that on the pitstop in question, they only pulled the car backwards – which is allowed. Phew…
The #98 Aston (dalla Lana, P43, 4th GTE-Am) has crashed heavily into Tertre Rouge!
You can see the live timing at https://www.fiawec.com/en/live
Update at 7 hours 21 minutes:
LMP1: #7 Toyota (Kobayashi)
LMP2: #26 G-Drive (Vergne P6)
GTE-Pro: #92 Porsche (Christensen P26)
GTE-Am: #77 Dempsey (Reid P39)
#54 Spirit of Race: 6th GTE-Am (Flohr P45)
Alonso is a fraud.
http://www.thedrive.com/accelerator/20662/toyota-fixed-running-order-potentially-orchestrated-alonsos-wec-win-at-spa
Toyota has issued team orders before – as has Audi and Peugeot before it. It’s not rare for LMP1 manufacturers to order cars not to race each other after the last stop.
It’s all happening!
#17 in the wall (Isaakayan, SMP, 4th)
#90 spun (Hankey, TF Sport, 50th, 8th GTE-Am)
#35 pitting for a puncture (Nato, SMP Racing, 13th LMP2)…
In time for Quest TV to return to action.
FERNANDO ALONSO IS A FRAUD!!
“This confirms that Conway had a faster car and could’ve passed Alonso had an agreement not been in place. While it’s understandable that Toyota simply wanted to play things safe and secure a one-two finish, it surely smells like a fabricated victory for Fernando Alonso.”
I believe I’ve already answered your point on this. The “no overtaking after the last stops” is standard practise for LMP1 manufacturers with win prospects in WEC.
Multi-21 Seb!
What the article says: the prearranged agreement was not to fight after the last pit stop, it was not in favor of any particular car. The conclusion is totally unwarranted. What you speak against Alonso says a lot more about yourself than about Alonso.
This happens in F1 too, in fact one team is famous for orchestrating their Number One driver to wins.
Eight hours into the race, no problem for the Toyota Gazoo team so far. #7 some 3.5 seconds ahead of #8, 3 laps ahead of the #3 Rebellion
That rear left on the 17 looked pretty beaten up. I can see why he can’t get going. Breaks my heart seeing drivers doing the best they can to drag the car to the pits.
Got to feel for the SMP team tonight.
Mikhael Isaakayan’s tried incredibly hard to get that going. Sorry it didn’t work out.
The #37 Chen LMP2 seems to be losing places fast. Might it be the cause of the yellow flag?
I stepped away for a while, when I left #8 was less than 10sec behind #7 … but is now multiple minutes down … what happened to enlarge that gap so dramatically? that seems like more than a simple pit stop. (?)
ok, i may have needed to refresh, looks more like 35sec now, still, seems unexpected.
I know exactly what you mean. The gaps evolve in ways I simply do not understand. But, considering the lack of panic on Toyota’s side, this kind of fluctuation isn’t too unusual.
Dont follow WEC all the time, but I heard from the commentary guys that the Corvettes wont be the best sounding track soon. Anyone know why? Shame, those beasts blow your ears out seeing them live.
iirc they’re looking to make them mid-engined … related maybe?
OK. No clue as to what the guys were eluding too. All they said was “it’s a shame the Corvettes wont sound like this soon”. They didn’t say anything more than that. But a mid engined Corvette? Urgh lol.
…….best sound car on the track
Car #8 has a stop-go for speeding in a slow zone!
Let’s say an hour before the finish the 8 car blows up.
Can, and if so, would Toyota put FA in the 7 car to give him a win.
Not possible. Driver entries are tied to a specific car.
Excellent, thanks.
YouTube LIVE STREAM on-board with Rebellion #1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kdXLrCHQyU
White circles… going round and round… with no clue who’s who… I’ll return to South Park, have fun you weirdos!
The gap between #7 and#8 less than 30 second, it was over 3:15 at the beginning of Alonso’s stint. But now it is Nakajima vs Lopez
Is anyone still up?
How is lonso doing? Has anyone been allowed to overtake him?
alonso had a great stint, gained around a minute on the number 7 i believe after being around 2min down….
nakajima in the car now about 7 seconds behind kobayashi. naka has been reporting brake issues though
Computer broke down just before midnight. Happy to see Fisichella is still in the race (and now 2nd in class).
Was it Lopez who lost all that time to Alonso?
Did no7 get told to slow? How is closing down from 2 min possible?
Looks like the latest yellow is not a car issue but a loose drain issue. I thought that was only a thing in single-seaters?
not sure if you are being sarcastic…
if not, i would be extremely worried about the chance of a metal grate hitting me at full speed, even in an enclosed cockpit
if you are being sarcastic…. i get it :P
I meant “I thought drain covers in non-single seaters generally stayed put”.
i think no matter what the series they want the drain covers to stay put… the amount of cars running over them obviously effects the welds
Where is the text commentary?
What’s the point in having this if there’s no direction in what’s going on in the actual race?
Well done to Rebellion after their start yesterday.
5 hours to the finish, Toyota still looking good, its Alonso vs Lopez again, 1:13 ALO ahead and lapping somewhat faster now. The Rebellions are 11 laps behind. JEV in the G-Drive and Christensen in the Porsche Ping Pig leading their categories.
The Eurosport commentators tell the same anecdote every year about the one time the Corvettes had such an advantage that they spent the closing stages of the race in the pits, angering the crowd. I’ve still got no idea when this happened… anyone know?
I’ve found a reference to the cars being parked and checked for 3 hours in 2001:
https://www.motorsport.com/alms/news/memories-of-corvette-racing-s-first-le-mans-victory/
The team cited the unassailable lead and the very wet conditions as the reasons to play it stationary. The Corvettes went on to finish behind the LM GT class winners, which were slower than LM GTS.
I also wondered, you made me look it up – it did actually happen, in 2001, see
http://www.hotrod.com/articles/the-history-of-corvette-racing/
Glad to see Nakajima at the wheel for the final laps. Remember him climbing out of that car 2 years ago… he deserves it.
Kazuki, don’t you dare to dissapoint Alonso’s fans!
Toyota in trouble!
Uh-oh. Car #7 is in trouble… it’s going to be a very twitchy hour and a half for the other Toyota now!
Just as you begin to think the race is done and dusted …
And they’re back in the game. That was weird.
Wow – they’re now saying it’s because of fuel. He was about to run out so they told him to go slow! I’m glad the #8 was already in front – can you imagine the conspiracy stories!? :D
Yeah, I can imagine what they’ll be like. But you know what? Screw those people. Their superpower is confirmation bias, they’re going to flood the comment sections with their bile no matter what has or hasn’t happened.
Toyota #7 pit wall used telemetry and hit
CTRL, ALT, DEL
That joke is so 1999. ^^
bring on the tin foil hat brigade about what really happened to number 7
Well, there you go, KOB missed pit entrance
Confirmed, car #7 missed pit entry and ran out of fuel
And now he got a 10-s penalty, I guess he didn’t quite run out of fuel, but did run into the fuel limit; so as he sped up again near the pits, he probably went over that.
To my understanding, he was penalised for exceeding the maximum amount of fuel per lap. In other words, that’s rather unlikely to have happened during a lap he spent a significant part of crawling around at 80 kph to save fuel.
The way I understood it, there is a max. amount of fuel per stint; and that is what he went over on that extra lap.
@bosyber
There is indeed a maximum amount of fuel per stint, i.e. a maximum amount of fuel that can be put into a car during a pit stop, but the penalty announcement for car #7 (as well as another competitor shortly after that) explicitly mentioned ‘fuel per lap’.
I’m not really into WEC but is Alonso in a 2 car race within the same team?
Yes, he’s running against Conway, Kobayashi, and I forget the other guy.
Well, in leMans24h, everyone is in a race with the car and time, I’d say, and with any competitors, and other traffic on track; but, yes, his only real competing car was the other Toyota.
Another penalty for car #7? This one missed pit entry will haunt Kobayashi-san in his dreams …
I’m not sure why Eurosport keeps talking about the “Epic Battle” in GTE Pro. Sure, it was a good race but didn’t the 911s run first and second for the bulk of the 24 hours?
The bigger issue is that under BOP it always feels like these outcomes are somewhat engineered, as I guess by definition they are, whether or not on purpose or not.
Well, there was an epic battle for 2nd between Makowiecki and Bourdais, so …
Well, I would like to congratulate Toyota on winning the 2019 24Hours of Le Mans!
Im always happy to see Fernando win, even in a “driver squad” race. He will already have to make up the time Buemi lost to Conway in the first stint!
test
Ah, so the comment section is upside down. Still odd that absolutely nobody is commenting.
I *am*
I’ve got the Ford 4-car feed on You Tube plus another screen showing the Rebellion #1 but their two race clocks are 30 seconds apart. Grrrr.
I expect I will be for the next few hours (for complicated reasons, I can’t do it during the day this year). RLM audio, no video.
Following it in a part-time way (necessitated due to family obligations) has been a frustrating experience this year. My favourites have had struggles and the limited information I’ve been able to get about them has been from specific Twitter searches. Ah, the perils of supporting GTE crews.
Safety car for #17 SMP’s crash is about to be recalled.
We are racing again!
The #71 AF Corse (the one with Sam Bird and James Calado in it) has retired with engine trouble. Not the biggest surprise ever as it had been in trouble for quite some time, but still sad.
We have rain as the Toyotas get within 3 seconds of one another (I’m sure there was a lap of gap between them last time I had TV 10 hours ago…)
Order after 10h 53m:
Overall leader: #8 Toyota (currently driven by Buemi), closely followed by #7 Toyota (Conway)
LMP2: #26 G-Drive (Rusinov P6), exiting the pit lane but clear of #36 Signatech (Thiriet)
GTE-Pro: #92 Porsche (Vanthoor P25), 6.9 seconds ahead of the #51 AF Corse (Serra)
GTE-Am: #85 Keating (Fraga P39), 1m 29 seconds ahead of #77 Dempsey (Andlauer)
Is there a channel in Asia carrying it?
Which part of Asia? (The only thing I can say covers the whole region is Radio Le Mans – radiolemans.co – and I suspect you want pictures).
The Toyotas are back to scrapping, almost as if one of them (the race-leading #7) wasn’t generating a steadily-increasing nimbus of smoke.
Safety car out. If this is for the #49 ARC limping back from 20th in LMP2 class, that will be a shame. And if it’s not, it will be a surprise given we’ve had a slow zone for a few minutes.
It’s confirmed – the #49 ARC is, unhappily, a retiree.
Safety car over!
Leaderboard after 12 h 10m:
Overall: #7 Toyota (Kobayashi)
LMP2: #26 G-Drive (Rusinov P6)
GTE-Pro: #92 Porsche (Estre P25)
GTE-Am: #85 Keating (Fraga P37)
3-minute stop/go for the #47 Cetilar (14th LMP2). Ignoring a red light at pit exit is never a good move…
The #70 MR (Beretta, P49, 12th GTE-Am) has a 60-second stop/go for Safety Car speeding.
The ByKolles is sadly having its usual troubles out there :(
Can’t see the #8 making it back at this stage
I stand corrected. Shame for the #7 with that sensor issue. If the 8 needs to put again we could have a close finish here
Was that real or just an excuse from Toyota to swap cars? (Haven’t follow the whole race)
The pit crew changed the wrong tyre according to a Radio Le Mans interview, so Lopez had to make a second stop… Disgracefully stupid.
Alonso world champion