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Saturday, 17th June 2006

The witching hour at Le Mans came for seemingly every other prototype team as the 2006 Le Mans 24 Hours entered its seventh hour with only a lucky few spared the dramas.

The plucky Pilbeam went sand surfing in the final chicane with driver Chris Macallister but was back on track following a thorough hovering while the already delayed Lister lost even more time with some shaky front bodywork.

G Force's woes continued with the power steering-less, manual gearbox driven Courage finally losing fifth gear altogether and stopping for more lengthy repairs that eventually led to its retirement.

Through it all came the serene #8 Audi, lapping as metronomically as ever and moving to a near three lap lead over the #17 Pescarolo with the Racing for Holland Dome and the second Audi completing the top four.

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Powerless to stop the McNish/Kristensen/Capello Audi from taking its fourth place, the Swiss Spirit Courage team held on to a fine fifth place overall, just ahead of the LMP2 leading RML Lola-MG with the Warren Hughes/Miguel Amaral/Miguel de Castro driven LMP2 Lola run by Chamberlain Racing up to ninth overall and the only other prototype left in the top 15 overall as the race reached seven and a half hours.

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