Pierre Ragues has completed his opening stints in this weekend’s Le Mans 24 Hours, his tenth participation in the legendary event.

 

It started to rain in the build-up to the start, meaning that the race commenced under safety car conditions. 

 

Pierre had the honour of starting for the Larbre Competition team and with the opening hour spent mainly behind the safety car, it was a cautious start to the 24-hour race. 

 

Starting on full wets, Pierre moved onto intermediates at his first stop – still under the safety car - after about 40 minutes. Unfortunately, he lost time during the stop as he had to wait at the pit exit. The entire stop took around three minutes, which lost the Frenchman some time.

 

Just ten minutes later, the safety car came in and the race got properly underway. Pierre got to grips with the #50 Corvette C7.R in the evolving conditions and pitted for slick tyres after 1h15 of the race as the track continued to dry. 

 

Pierre continued with strong pace when he returned to the track, establishing the team’s fight up the classification. Among the quickest in the GTE-Am class, Pierre was determined to make up positions, handing over to Jean-Philippe Belloc. 

 

Belloc continued the strong momentum from Pierre making up positions to fourth in GTE-Am, before himself handing over to Yutaka Yamagishi after five hours of the race.