Aston Martin LMP1, Fastest Petrol Car at Le Mans

After the qualification stage for the 77th Le Mans 24 Hours Race ended on Thursday, Aston Martin found itself occupying the top three spots for petrol powered cars on the Le Mans grid. Even if they admit this is of little significance to the outcome of the race, being in pole-position has some appeal for the British manufacturer.

Overall, the LMP1s haven't done as good. The 007 car of Jan Charouz, Tomas Enge and Stefan Mucke was the quickest Aston Martin with a time of 3m27.180s, qualifying in eighth overall. The 008 car of Anthony Davidson , Darren Turner and Jos Verstappen came in ninth with a time of 3m27.704, while the 009 car of Stuart Hall, Peter Kox and Harold Primat qualified 17th after setting a time of 3m33.968s.

“I used the first two hours of the session just to get used to driving the car in the dry. With free practice having been held in mixed conditions yesterday, this was our first chance to have some normal dry running. In the second part of the session I wasn’t really going for a quick lap time, as our focus is firmly on the race. But the car felt very good and I was pleased with the time we produced, despite the fact that we were held up by a lot of traffic," Stefan Mucke said.

Anthony Davidson also complained of traffic conditions and admits his car was far from an ideal lap. "However, I think our race pace is more indicative of our potential than qualifying, so this is very encouraging for the weekend," he added.

This year, as was the case in the previous two, the pole went to French driver Stephane Sarrazin and the No 08 Peugeot 908 Hdi. The race starts tomorrow at 3 PM Le Mans local time.