Audi takes grid front row
Staff Reporter
Posted Fri, 16 Jun 2006
Audi's R10 TDI has become the first diesel car to take pole position in the 74 years of the Le Mans 24 Hour race.
During the last two hour qualifying session, Rinaldo Capello drove the number 7 Audi around the La Sarthe circuit two seconds quicker than last year's pole time at three minutes 30.466 seconds. He shares the car with Scotsman Allan McNish and Tom Kristensen.
Marco Wenner, driving the number 8 Audi, ensured the team filled out row one of the grid. His co-drivers are former F1 driver Emanuele Pirro and Frank Biela.
"I wasn't really trying to improve our time, but the car had been running well," Capello said. "I got a perfectly clean flying lap, so I was lucky. Marco Werner, in the sister No.8 Audi, wasn't so lucky, so he lost a couple of tenths of a second. He could very well have taken pole from us.
"We are not using qualifying tyres, as they don't even last us a full lap, because of the tremendous torque on this car. We are using the softest possible race tyres we have."
Row two on the grid for Saturday's race is filled out by Team Pescarolo, with the Nicolas Minassian, Emmanuel Collard and Erik Comas in third place.
World rally champ Sebastien Loeb and Super Aguri Formula 1 driver Franck Montagny start from fourth in the Pescarolo they share with Eric Helary.
In the GT1 category, Aston Martin have the edge over Corvette with its two DBR9s, taking first and second places. Czech driver Tomas Enge took a record fifth consecutive pole position at the La Sarthe circuit.
"I love the circuit, I always want to be fastest here," said the Aston Martin driver. "I know we have a fast car, I know we have a consistent car here."
Pedro Lamy, Stephane Sarrazin and Stephane Ortelli drove the other DBR9 into second place on the grid.
Max Papis brought the Corvette in third.
The pole sitter in the GT2 category is the Porsche 911 run by Team IMSA Performance Matmut. But driver Luca Riccitelli
lost control of the car and crashed during the second qualifying session, raising questions over whether his Porsche will be ready for the start on Saturday.
