Press Release N° 18
06h00 to 08h00

The day starts quietly
Sunday, June 17th, 2001
Day has dawned on Le Mans, and the Audis' supremacy goes on. The tricky track has caused a few spins during these two hours of race.

It has dawned on Le Mans, and the weather is always threatening. Rain is forecast, and there are strong gushes of wind. But the horizon is perfectly clear for the two official Audis. No problems have been reported for the leading cars.
On the other hand, Racing for Holland confirmed the withdrawal of Dome n°9, due to an electrical problem. The car, which was very impressive during the practice sessions, proved rather unlucky during the race. Ascari made the same announcement concerning its n°20, because of a broken engine. The n°21, which had been immobilized in the pits for hours, and which had driven only 60 laps, restarted with Xavier Pompidou at the wheel for 6 laps, but the problems reappeared.
The n°64 Corvette accumulated disaster after disaster. First, Franck Fréon remained for 15 minutes in the pits because of a starter failure. Then, the French driver went into a spin twice. One of the two spins occurred at the Ford chicane, a particularly tricky portion of the circuit. Indeed, Wayne Taylor's n°6 Cadillac went off the track at the same spot, and lost a few places. Olivier Beretta's n°16 Chrysler did a spectacular figure there too, but the driver did not go back to the pits.
On the other hand, it's over for the n°62 Saleen, which was 10th in the main provisional ranking and 2nd in GTS. After having smoked up part of the circuit, the team has decided to withdraw, due to a very serious engine valve problem.
The last Viper left, n°58, is also at a halt, but the technicians at Larbre Competition can't seem to find what's causing the problem.
After 15 hours and 7 minutes of race, the leading Audi had already clocked up 200 laps, and had covered a total of 2,721 km.
Sébastien Bourdais is doing well in his n°17 Courage : he has completed 3 consecutive stints and is gradually climbing up the ranking.
By 8 o'clock, the n°1 Audi was 2 laps ahead of n°2, and 11 ahead of the n°8 Bentley. In 4th position, we now have the n°16 Chrysler, which is in front of the n°6 Cadillac. The n°63 Corvette is 6th and is therefore 1st in GTS. It's ahead of the n°38 Reynard, which is still leading the way in LMP 675, although it's having some serious difficulties with engine cooling system. The team must regularly top up the water tank, so the situation is a bit difficult. The other LMP 675 left in the race is the WR, and it's 33 laps behind.
In GT, team Freisinger Motorsport's n°77 Porsche is still in the lead. Note that there have been only two withdrawals in that category.