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Figure 1: pit stops during caution periods No


Car


Pit stop time


Time of day


Comments


8 Peugeot 908 4m 05.5s 16:46 Driver change, repairs to brake distribution unit


8 Peugeot 908 2m 57.2s 22:43 Fuel only 9 Peugeot 908 3m 57.2s 00:01 Fuel only 7 Peugeot 908 4m 13.5s 00:09 Driver change 2 Audi R18 TDI 3m 11.6s 00:20 Driver change 9 Peugeot 908 1m 56.5s 06:07 Fuel only 2 Audi R18 TDI 2m 17.2s 07:58 Driver change


Figure 2: Comparison of Lap Times


13:00.00 12:00.00 11:00.00 10:00.00 09:00.00 08:00.00 07:00.00 06:00.00 05:00.00 04:00.00 03:00.00 02:00.00 01:00.00 00:00.00


Audi RI8 No 2 Peugeot 908 No 9


LAP 1 12 23 34 45 56 67 78 89 100 111 122 133 144 155 166 177 188 199 210 221 232 243 254 265 276 287 298 309 320 331 342 353


The scene was set for an epic battle, with three Audi R18s against three Peugeot 908s. Audi lost two cars before midnight to big accidents; Peugeot remained at full strength throughout


time spent in the pits (the sum of the time spent stationary in front of the garage and the time spent waiting for the pit exit light to go green), varies wildly in this table, the overall effect is the same, since in each case only one safety car has gone past while the affected car is in the pits being worked on. In this case, the overall time lost is more or less one third of a lap, or 70 seconds for an LMP1 car, plus time for each car in the safety car ‘train’ at the back of which you rejoin.


As can be seen from figure


1, the most fortunate in this regard was Peugeot number 7, which only had to stop once under caution, whereas the other contenders had to stop twice.


LAP TIMES Let’s look at the race between the Tréluyer / Lotterer / Fässler Audi and the Bordais / Pagenaud / Lamy Peugeot in more detail. In figure 2 (above), the lap times for each car are shown across the whole of the race. The periods


under full course caution are easy to see. And if you look closely at the period towards the end of the race you can see how the drizzle from about 12:15 (lap 309) on Sunday affected the lap times. Figure 3 (overleaf) shows


the gap between the same two cars over the course of the race, regardless of their positions overall. If the plotted line is above the x-axis then the Audi (no 2) is ahead. If below, then the Peugeot (no 9) is ahead. For clarity, the yellow shaded areas show the safety car periods. From this, it struck me that


the race can be split into three distinct phases:


• Phase 1: from the start until Rockenfeller’s accident at 22:40 (lap 117) • Phase 2: from Rockenfeller’s accident (or perhaps better put, from the withdrawal of the safety car following the incident) until about 06:40 Sunday morning (lap 221) • Phase 3: From 06:40 to the end of the race


PHASE 1 Before the race, it had been suggested that what the Peugeot lacked in speed might be compensated by its better fuel economy. If that were to be the case, then it would have to spend less time in the pits. Figure 4


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