BMW France have taken provisional pole for the prestigious Le Mans 24-Hour with Honda TT Legends in seventh place.
In a bit of a crash-fest session , BMW just edged out SRC Kawasaki despite a best individual performance by Julien da Costa with a lap in 1’36.826. The trio for the race has not yet been finalised. Freddy Foray and Olivier Four are in competition for the third spot alongside Julien da Costa and Gregory Leblanc.
In third place coming out of this first session, the Suzuki Endurance Racing Team confirmed the choice of Takuya Tsuda of Japan to join forces with Vincent Philippe and Anthony Delhalle, who binned it.
SERT are ahead of Yamaha France GMT 94 Michelin Yamalube, with Matthieu Lagrive back on the job, and Monster Energy Yamaha YART again fielding its usual trio of Igor Jerman, everyone's favourite grandad Steve Martin and Gwen 'Stefani' Giabbani.
Honda TT Legends men John McGuinness and Cameron Donald both posted times in the 1.40s, while stand-in rider and Le Mans specialist Mathieu Gines secured a lap of 1.39:025, equalling a combined average time of 1.40:071.
"It’s not a bad qualification. The top six teams tested here on Tuesday and they’re peaking now, so I guess we’re a day behind but I think we’ll be faster tomorrow. I’m actually quicker already than I was during the whole event last year. Like we always say, qualifying is not the be all and end all here, it’s where we’re going to be come 3pm on Sunday afternoon that’s the most important bit," said McPint.
