The Virgo Motorsport team hit early problems in its debut Le Mans 24 Hours after Rob Bell was involved in an incident on pit lane.

The reigning Le Mans Series GT2 title winners were running strongly in the GT2 class when Bell came into the pits to refuel and hand the car over to team-mate Tim Mullen.

However, as the Briton came into the pits he was hit by the GT1 Aston Martin of Team Modena which caused damage to the rear of the Ferrari.

Although it returned to the track, third driver Tim Sugden admitted that the incident didn't need to happen.

"We were just coming up to change drivers," he said. "Rob was in the car, and he was just pulling into our garage as the Modena Aston was pulling out. I don't honestly know what happened or why it happened, but the two cars came into contact – it looked to me like it was certainly more the fault of the Modena car.

"Apparently it had stalled, and if it had gone at the time it was supposed to go it would have been fine, but by the time he'd stalled and started it again it was obviously too close and clipped the back of Rob's car. That damaged out rear bumper and has taken a couple of little aero bits off. It's probably not a major problem, but we could just do without it.

"We've got oversteer, but we had oversteer before it happened so it's very hard to say [how it has affected performance], but those little things are on there for a reason and they're not there anymore, so it isn't going to make it any better, that's for sure. Apart from that we're alright, but it's only an hour-and-a-half in and there's a long way to go."