24 Hours of Le Mans Results

Porsche have won their first 24 Hours of Le Mans since 1998 as they outlasted the #7 Audi to record a 1-2 as the #19 car took the checkered flag.

Porsche's victory marks the first non-Audi victory at Le Mans since 2009, whilst Nico Hulkenberg and Earl Bamber both became the first rookies to win the race since 1998.

The race itself was a case of swings and roundabouts but superb night stints from Tandy and Hulkenberg allowed the #19 to make up time lost in an early safety car period, before three Audi machines ran into trouble in the early hours of the morning which gave Porsche a sizeable lead.

Behind the #19 car was the #17 car of Webber, Bernhard and Hartley who fell out of contention early in the race after serving a one minute penalty for a yellow flag infringement, whilst the #7 Audi completed the podium a further three laps down after losing bodywork which forced several unscheduled stops.

Outside of the top three the pole sitting #18 Porsche ran into several problems across the 24 hours, most notably twice hitting the tyre wall at Mulsanne corner, whilst the #8 Audi crashed early in the race after making contact whilst trying to lap one of the AF Corse GT cars.

Toyota meanwhile were almost completely anonymous throughout the race eventually coming home 9 and 10 laps down respectively, Rebellion had a nightmare race with a best finish of 18th for the #13 entry. Team ByKolles were 39th and Nissan only got one car to flag, 154 laps down on the #19 Porsche, after a late race engine failure took the #23 car out of the race.

In LMP2 there was little the teams could do to get close to the #47 KCMG, even after it stopped twice on track before firing once again, as the Hong Kong based team brought home a commanding victory.

Behind KCMG was JOTA Sport, who managed to pip the G-Drive car of Rusinov, Canal and Bird after Oliver Turvey pulled out a nice overtake in the 22nd hour after having spent the first hour in the pitlane with a gearbox issue.

In the GT classes Corvette took the honours in a scrappy GTE Pro race as every one of their fellow Pro cars suffered mechanical issues.

When they actually had cars to race it was Aston Martin who proved their strongest contender, at least before the #97 suffered an engine failure during the night and the #99 crashed into an LMP2 car in the very early hours of the morning.

This left Corvette to fight with the tenacious #51 AF Corse, but when the Ferrari suffered a gearbox problem very late in the race this left Corvette with a 5 lap advantage over the second #71 entry.

Finally in GTE Am there was late drama as the #98 Aston Martin, which has dominated the WEC season so far and held a truly commanding lead during the race, crashed out with Paul Dalla Lana at the wheel with just forty minutes left on the clock, gifting class victory the #72 SMP entry instead.

SMP lead home the Patrick Dempsey backed Porsche car which recorded it's first podium finish of the year by holding off a tough challenge from the #62 Scuderia Corsa Ferrari who had to settle for third.

2015 24 Hours of Le Mans Official Results

1. LMP1 - #19 Porsche Team (Hülkenberg, Bamber, Tandy)
2. LMP1 - #17 Porsche Team (Bernhard, Webber, Hartley) - +1 Lap
3. LMP1 - #7 Audi Sport Team Joest (Lotterer, Fässler, Treluyer) - +3 Laps
4. LMP1 - #8 Audi Sport Team Joest (Di Grassi, Duval, Jarvis) - +3 Laps
5. LMP1 - #18 Porsche Team (Dumas, Jani, Lieb) - +4 Laps
6. LMP1 - #2 Toyota Racing (Wurz, Sarrazin, Conway) - +9 Laps
7. LMP1 - #9 Audi Sport Team Joest (Albuquerque, Bonanomi, Rast) - +9 Laps
8. LMP1 - #1 Toyota Racing (Davidson, Buemi, Nakajima) - +10 Laps
9. LMP2 - #47 KCMG (Howson, Bradley, Lapierre) - +37 Laps
10. LMP2 - #38 JOTA Sport (Dolan, Turvey, Evans) - +38 Laps
11. LMP2 - #26 G-Drive Racing (Rusinov, Canal, Bird) - +38 Laps
12. LMP2 - #28 G-Drive Racing (Yacamán, González, Derani) - +42 Laps
13. LMP2 - #48 Murphy Prototypes (Chandhok, Berthon, Patterson) - +48 Laps
14. LMP2 - #27 SMP Racing (Mediani, Minassian, Markozov) - +56 Laps
15. LMP2 - #31 Extreme Speed Motorsports (Brown, Fogarty, Van Overbeek) - +56 Laps
16. LMP2 - #45 Ibañez Racing (Ibañez, Bellarosa, Perret) - +58 Laps
17. GTE Pro - #64 Corvette Racing-GM (Gavin, Milner, Taylor) - +59 Laps
18. LMP1 - #13 Rebellion Racing (Kraihamer, Imperatori, Abt) - +59 Laps
19. LMP2 - #29 Pegasus Racing (Roussel, Cheng, Tung) - +59 Laps
20. GTE Am - #72 SMP Racing (Shaytar, Bertolini, Basov) - +61 Laps
21. GTE Pro - #71 AF Corse (Rigon, Calado, Beretta) - +64 Laps
22. GTE Am - #77 Dempsey Racing-Proton (Dempsey, Long, Seefried) - +65 Laps
23. GTE Am - #62 Scuderia Corsa (Sweedler, Bell, Segal) - +66 Laps
24. LMP1 - #12 Rebellion Racing (Prost, Heidfeld, Beche)- +66 Laps
25. GTE Pro - #51 AF Corse (Bruni, Vilander, Fisichella) - +66 Laps
26. GTE Am - #83 AF Corse (Perrodo, Collard, Águas) - +66 Laps
27. GTE Pro - #95 Aston Martin Racing (Nygaard, Sørensen, Thiim) - +66 Laps
28. LMP2 - #30 Extreme Speed Motorsport (Sharp, Dalziel, Hansson) - +66 Laps
29. LMP2 - #35 OAK Racing (Nicolet, Merlin, Maris) - +67 Laps
30. GTE Pro - #91 Porsche Team Manthey (Lietz, Christensen, Bergmeister) - +69 Laps
31. GTE Am - #61 AF Corse (Mann, Gianmaria, Cressoni) - +69 Laps
32. GTE Am - #98 Aston Martin Racing (Dalla Lana, Lamy, Lauda) - +73 Laps
33. LMP2 - #40 Krohn Racing (Krohn, Jönsson) - +73 Laps
34. LMP2 - #37 SMP Racing (Aleshin, A. Ladygin, K. Ladygin) - +73 Laps
35. GTE Am - #68 Team AAI (H.C. Chen, Vannelet, Parisy) - +74 Laps
36. GTE Pro - #99 Aston Martin Racing V8 (Rees, MacDowall, Stanaway) - +76 Laps
37. GTE Am - #66 JMW Motorsport (Alfaisal, Giermaziak, Avenatti) - +76 Laps
38. GTE Am - #67 Team AAI (J. S. Chen, Kapadia, Maassen) - +79 Laps
39. LMP1 - #4 Team ByKolles (Trummer, Monteiro, Kaffer) - +136 Laps
40. LMP1 - #22 Nissan Motorsport (Tincknell, Buncombe, Krumm) - +154 Laps
41. LMP2 - #34 OAK Racing (Cumming, Vanthoor) - RET
42. GTE Am - #53 Riley Motorsports-TI Auto (Bleekemolen, Keating, Miller) - RET
43. LMP2 - #42 Strakka Racing (Leventis, Kane, Watts) - RET
44. GTE Am - #55 AF Corse (Cameron, Griffin, Mortimer) - RET
45. LMP1 - #23 Nissan Motorsports (Pla, Mardenborough, Chilton) - RET
46. LMP2 - #46 Thiriet by TDS Racing (Thiriet, Badey, Gommendy) - RET
47. GTE Am - #96 Aston Martin Racing (Goethe, Hall, Castellacci) - RET
48. LMP2 - #43 Team SARD Morand (Webb, Ragues, Amberg) - RET
49. LMP1 - #21 Nissan Motorsport (Shulzhitskiy, Ordóñez, Matsuda) - RET
50. LMP2 - #36 Signatech Alpine (Panciatici, Chatin, Capillaire) - RET
51. GTE Pro - #97 Aston Martin Racing (Turner, Mücke, Bell) - RET
52. GTE Am - #50 Larbre Competition (Roda, Ruberti, Poulsen) - RET
53. LMP2 - #41 Greaves Motorsport (Hirsch, Lancaster, Wirdheim) - RET
54. GTE Am - #88 Abu Dhabi-Proton Racing (Ried, Bachler, Al Qubaisi) - RET
55. GTE Pro - #92 Porsche Team Manthey (Pilet, Makowiecki, Henzler) - RET
56. GTE Pro - #63 Corvette Racing-GM (Magnussen, Garcia, Briscoe) - DNS

Pleased for Hulkenberg

A victory Nico Hulkenberg has waited for his whole life. He's finally landed one of the big ones to put on the CV. Should he not get a seat at the top table of F1, he will win a world championship in WEC without a shadow of a doubt.

I bet these guys weren't lifting and coasting.