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Karun Chandhok completes first qualifying session for 24 Hours of Le Mans
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Indian racing driver Karun Chandhok sets 11th fastest time in the first qualifying session of 24 Hours of Le Mans
In his first outing at the historic 24 Hours of Le Mans race, Karun Chandhok and his team JRM sets the 11th fastest time with 3:37.088 on the clock. The former Formula 1 driver will participate in the race alongside David Brabham and Peter Dumbreck using the Honda HPD ARX-3a to contest in the LMP1 category.
Brabham opened by running three runs in the 90minute practice session for JRM. The 2009 Le Mans winner recorded a best time of 3:34.641 for the team classifying 10th overall. Chandhok then took over from Brabham but unfortunately for the Chennai lad he experienced some instability in the rear of the car forcing him to return to the pits after just a single run. Dumbreck was first to take the wheel in the second practice qualifying session, in which he completed four timed laps for his team and clocked an overall best time of 3:37.088. Chandhok then posted three more laps before handing over the wheel to Brabham to wrap up the day’s session.
He will be the first Indian driver to participate in the 24 Hours of Le Mans race. “Today was about getting more time in the car and fine tuning the balance. We’re still very new round here, both myself and the team, so the learning curve is very steep. We’ve made a lot of changes as we’ve understood more about the tyre warm up and performance, plus the behaviour of the new aero package. It’s been a fairly tough day as the grip is low and temperatures have changed throughout the sessions but we are still learning all the time. On the plus side we have covered a lot of ground and there’s a lot of time between now and qualifying tomorrow to completely understand how we can improve,” he said delighted with the time spent on the track.
Although the team completed its mandatory night qualifying laps for each driver, and did some more checks on the car, the drivers seem to feel the lack of grip on the tyres. The Honda didn’t run on any new rubber and drivers had to struggle to keep the tyres up to temperature. “We do have an idea of why this is happening, which gives us a direction to go tonight,” said Team Manager and Chief Engineer Nigel Stepney.
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