2025 24 Hours of Le Mans: Cadillac leads Ferrari in twice red-flagged opening practice
No38 Jota-run Cadillac was fastest in FP1 at Le Mans
Cadillac led the opening practice for the 2025 24 Hours of Le Mans after the No38 Jota-run car of Sebastien Bourdais, Jenson Button and Earl Bamber topped a twice red-flagged FP1.
The opening session ahead of the 2025 edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans proved to be a lively one, as numerous incidents interrupted the three hours of running.
The No38 Jota Cadillac battled its way through numerous problems to eventually top FP1 after a late qualifying simulation from Sebastien Bourdais put the car fastest with a 3m25.148s lap.
He led the No50 Ferrari AF Corse entry, with Antonio Fuoco posting a 3m25.302s lap early in the session that the crew would not better through to the chequered flag.
Porsche completed the top three outright and in the Hypercar class with the No6 963 entry driven by Matt Campbell.
The three-hour session began at 2pm local time but would be interrupted just 10 minutes in by a Full Course Yellow due to an off for the No24 Nielsen Racing LMP2 car that would end up beached in the gravel.
When the green flag was brought back out, the No38 Jota Cadillac had a near-miss at the Ford chicane when the car - driven by Earl Bamber at the time - spun off and nearly made contact with an LMGT3 car upon rejoining.
Bamber complained over the radio of problems with his brakes, echoing complaints that have been made by other Cadillac drivers since the official test day last Sunday.
After the first half an hour of running, the No50 Ferrari led the way with 3m25.302s, which wouldn’t be bettered until the final hour.
With just under an hour and 45 minutes to go, the red flag was brought out for the first time when the No63 Iron Lynx Mercedes AMG-GT3 of Stephen Grove crashed on the way into the Dunlop chicane.
The session was quickly restarted around 10 minutes later, but would be stopped again due to an issue on track with an hour and 20 minutes to go.
The final part of the session would run largely without incident, with the No38 Jota Cadillac piloted by Bourdais firing in its FP1-topping 3m25.148s with just under 40 minutes remaining.
The No38 car would see out the session 0.154s clear of the field, with Jenson Button reporting over the radio after his final run that the machine was working better than it was a few hours ago.
Fuoco’s 3m25.302s lap would keep reigning Le Mans winner Ferrari second, with Porsche sneaking into third with the No6 car.
Toyota was fourth with the No8 car of Sebastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley and Ryo Hirakawa, while the No5 Porsche Penske Motorsport entry of Julien Andlauer, Michael Christensen and Mathieu Jaminet completed the top five.
Will Stevens put the No12 Jota Cadillac into sixth late on ahead of the No4 Porsche Penske car, the No15 WRT BMW, the No35 Alpine and the No99 Proton Competition-run Porsche.
Fastest time in the LMGT3 class went to the No78 Akkodis ASP Team Lexus crew of Jack Hawkworth, Finn Gehrsitz and Arnold Robin, while the No46 WRT BMW crew featuring Valentino Rossi was 11th in class.
Top LMP2 honours went to the No16 RLR M Sport Oreca 07 driven by Ryan Cullen, Patrick Pilet and Mikkel Jensen.
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