Toyota takes pole for 2014 24 Hours of Le Mans

It was a tough day for drivers at the Circuit de la Sarthe as seven red flags hampered the proceedings in the qualifying session of the 2014 24 Hours of Le Mans. But Toyota and Porsche stood tall amongst others to lock out the front two rows of the grid. The No.7 Toyota of Alexander Wurz, Stephane Sarrazin and Kazuki Nakajima secured pole position for the legendary race. Nakajima posted a brilliant lap of 3:21.789 minutes and became the first Japanese driver in history to secure pole position in Le Mans. 

The most successful manufacturer in the history of the sport, Porsche didn’t fail to make its mark as well, that too despite being absent from the scene since the past 16 years. Just 0.357 seconds shy of pole-sitter, the No .14 Porsche 919 Hybrid took the second best spot on the grid at the hands of Romain Dumas. Partnering Dumas for the 24 Hour race will be Neel Jani and Marc Lieb. 

Making things even more promising for Toyota and Porsche is the fact that that their team-mates, with third and fourth place on the grid respectively, have managed to secure a good place in qualifying as well. 

Last year’s winner, Audi on the other hand hasn’t quite had the kind of start that they would have hoped for. Loic Duval, driving the No.1 Audi R18 e-tron Quattro suffered a high speed crash during one of the practice sessions on Wednesday. Travelling at a 270kmph, Duval lost control and hit the barriers completely wrecking the car. Fortunately the Frenchman was unhurt but was sent to the hospital immediately as a precautionary measure. Duval has not been cleared for the race and will be replaced by Marc Gene. The German team had to burn the midnight oil to get the car ready in time for qualifying. The three Audi cars showed lack of pace in qualifying and could only manage to secure a fifth, sixth and seventh place on the grid respectively. 

Indian racing driver, Karun Chandhok was all set to secure a place in the top three after some impressive runs in the Practice sessions, when he crashed at the Indianapolis corner but fortunately managed to walk away unhurt. Luckily, the damage to the car was only cosmetic. Setting a fastest time of 3:38.207 minutes in the second session, Chandhok’s team Murphy Prototypes took sixth place on the gird in the LMP2 class. Chandhok will be joined by Rodolfo Gonzalez and Nathanel Berthon as he attempts to put his LMP2 Nissan V8-powered Oreca 03 on the podium in his third attempt.