Subscribe

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Motorsport prime

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Edition

Global

The 'Pesage' as apéritif

22 cars and 66 drivers passed one by one through the various inspections.

#20 Porsche Team Porsche 919 Hybrid

#20 Porsche Team Porsche 919 Hybrid

Eric Gilbert

The great week of Le Mans is launched! The 'Pesage' opened the hostilities today that will gradually build to their anticipated climax : The 82nd edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans on the 14th and 15th of June.

At 14:30 this Sunday the 8th of June, as a hot sun shone on the Place de la République in Le Mans, mechanics of G-Drive pushed the Ligier JS P2-Nissan into the area of technical and administrative inspection. The n°35 is the first of 55 cars entered in the 82nd edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans to be subjected to scrupulous inspection by the scrutineers.

Meanwhile, the British drivers Alex Brundle and Jann Mardenborough and Russian Mark Schulzhitskiy, the three drivers who share this machine, went through administrative checks before meeting with representatives of the press, pose for the group photo in front of their car and then answer questions from the commentator on a large stage facing the public on a free access seating area that has been specially installed this year.

So all afternoon in front of a particularly large and passionate public, 22 cars and 66 drivers passed one by one through the various inspections.

After the pride of going first for the Ligier, 39 years after its last appearance at Le Mans, the Automobile Club de l'Ouest closed the first day of scrutineering with the spectacular Nissan ZEOD RC that will participate in the event as the Garage 56 entry, that is to say, outside normal classification.

Highlights of the day were of course the presentation of Ligier but also the much anticipated appearance of two Porsche 919 Hybrids and the Toyota TS040 Hybrid the pundit's favourite after a good start to the season.

Another star ambushed by countless fans: Patrick Dempsey. There was a huge roar from the crowd when the actor mounted the official stage to answer questions from the commentator. Hollywood was ubiquitous with the advent of four of the leading roles in the film 513 (released June 11): for Malik Barnhardt, Tom Sizemore, Gary Dourdan, Bokeem Woodbine, following an agreement with the team Newblood by Morand Racing.In the late afternoon, Fabien Barthez was not left out and the crowd also gave him a warm welcome.

Scrutineering (Pesage) continues tomorrow Monday the 9th of June. The first of the 33 cars will be the Oreca 03R-Nissan n°27 of SMP Racing before a long line of Ferrari and Aston Martin that will fight for victory in the highly competitive LM GTE Pro and Am classes. In LM P1, the public will be able to see the new Rebellion R-One from 13:30 the three cars of the championship leading Audi team at 15:10. The day concludes at 16:50 with the two new Corvette C7. An opportunity not to be missed : The Corvette team have a surprise in store for the public !

For those who can't attend the event, it can be followed live on WebTV of the 24 Hours of Le Mans (www.24h-lemans.com) and the highlights on photo and video in the new mobile app of the 24 Hours of Le Mans available at the AppStore and Google Play.

A.C.O.

Be part of Motorsport community

Join the conversation
Previous article A word from... Tom Kristensen
Next article Scrutineering: What the drivers have to say

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

Sign up for free

  • Get quick access to your favorite articles

  • Manage alerts on breaking news and favorite drivers

  • Make your voice heard with article commenting.

Motorsport prime

Discover premium content
Subscribe

Edition

Global