The Oreca Matmut-tended Peugeot 908 HDI FAP secured its first Le Mans Series in the Algarve on Saturday. Panis/Lapierre/Sarrazin were joined on the podium by the N°12 Rebellion Racing Lola B10/60 (Prost/Jani) and the N°008 Aston Martin Lola (Ragues/Mailleux/Ickx).

Oreca Peugeot

It ended up being a perfect weekend in Portugal for the Oreca squad which posted the fastest time in all three practice sessions, qualified on pole position, pocketed the fastest race lap and took outright victory in the 1,000km do Algarve, round three of the 2010 Le Mans Series. Olivier Panis, Nicolas Lapierre and Stéphane Sarrazin took turns at the wheel of the French diesel-powered prototype to win by the comfortable margin of five laps over the N°12 Lola and seven laps over the N°008 Aston Martin.

The two Rebellion Racing Lolas qualified on the first two rows but were forced to start from the back of the grid when the N°12 car suffered a problem with its flat bottom and the N°13 car had to change tyres. Even so, the two petrol-fuelled prototypes, which benefited from a bigger-diameter air restrictor this weekend, quickly fought their way back into the top three. The N°12 car of Jani/Prost took the chequered flag in second spot, but the N°13 sister machine of Boullion/Belicchi was involved in an accident and had to settle for 20th place.

The bonze medal went to the N°008 Aston Martin of Franck Mailleux, Pierre Ragues and Vanina Ickx, despite the trio being handed a stop&go penalty early on.

The LMP2 prototypes figured at the sharp end of the leaderboard for much of the weekend and the Strakka Racing HPD-ARX 01c (Watts/Kane/Leventis) led for 3½ hours before being stopped in its tracks. Following mechanical trouble for the N°40 Ginetta-Zytek and transmission problems for the two OAK Racing Pescarolo-Judds, the class win went to the RML HPD (Newton/Erdos/Collins) ahead of the N°41 Team Bruichladdich Ginetta and the best-placed Formula Le Mans contender (N°44, Hughes/Firth).

The LMGT2 class was dominated by the Michelin-equipped Ferrari F430s which monopolised the podium in qualifying before handing AF Corse a one-two finish in the race itself. The N°96 car of Bruni/Melo cruised home to an easy category win and seventh overall, but there was a thrilling scrap for second place in LMGT2 towards the end of the race between entre the N°95 Ferrari (Vilander/Alesi/Fisichella) and the N°77 Felbermayr-Proton Porsche (Lieb/Lietz). The final word went to Finland’s Toni Vilander, while the N°92 Aston Martin Vantage came fourth. The LMGT1 battle produced another win for the Larbre Compétition Saleen S7-R.

Algarve, Michelin, Oreca, Peugeot, Victoire