By: Andrew Crask and David Phillips | October 13, 2018 7:27 PMAs always, Petit Le Mans provided a blend of endurance and flat-out racing, with fortunes rising and falling over the course of the 10 hours as traffic, track conditions, tire wear and driver form affected cars tightly balanced in performance — while the fickle hands of fate, circumstance and red mist dealt random wild cards. While that might lead you to assume that meant the final laps were all that mattered, it was all connected. It was always close, for 10 hours, in all three classes.

With two corners to go, Filipe Albuquerque ran out of fuel in the Action Express No. 5 Cadillac, enabling Renger Van Der Zande to squirt through and take the Prototype win in the Wayne Taylor Racing No. 10 Cadillac he shared with Jordan Taylor and Ryan Hunter-Reay. Action Express had some comfort though, as its No. 31 pairing of Eric Curran and Felipe Nasr — joined by Gabby Chaves for Saturday’s 10-hour race — held on to win the championship. Just.

The drama was different but no less in GTLM, where Patrick Pilet, Nick Tandy and Frederic Makowiecki took the victory while Corvette Racing’s Jan Magnussen and Antonio Garcia overcame extreme odds to hold on to the driver’s championship. Just.And in GTD, Cooper MacNeil, Daniel Serra and Gunnar Jeannette took a no less nail-biting win while Bryan Sellers and Madison Snow took the title. Just.Results

Prototype: Nothing is certain

The race began — and neared its end — looking like a perfect sendoff for the Patron ESM Nissan team, but polesitter Pipo Derani’s early lead with the No. 22 Nissan DPi came to an abrupt end 26 minutes in when a left-rear tire puncture forced the Brazilian to limp slowly to the pits. More frustration for the ESM Patron Nissan team hit just before the three-hour mark, as the No. 2 dropped from second place overall with a hub problem at the left front, forcing it behind the wall for a replacement to be fitted. But the racing gods were just getting started.

The title-contending No. 54 CORE autosport ORECA was up against it from the early stages, dropping two laps to the leaders before cracking back into the lead lap and the top 5 with an ironman stint by Colin Braun. There they stayed, bouncing ahead or just behind title rivals Action Express. The LMP2 cars demonstrated their usual advantage on fuel mileage, if not quite the outright speed of the DPI cars, enabling them to cycle to the front at regular intervals.

“We’re pretty good on the front side of a run, but we struggle a bit on old tires like everybody does,” shrugged Braun at mid-race.A key moment came with just under two hours to go when Jordan Taylor was balked momentarily by a GT car coming out of the pits, and Albuquerque never hesitated, scything past the Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac to grab the lead and sprinting out to a 3sec advantage before another full-course yellow for the stricken No. 52 ORECA of Will Owen, packing everyone up once again and prompting pit stops for all the leaders.

Which left…Pipo Derani back in front. The polesitter, who had been the first of many to encounter tire punctures back in the opening hour, had been fighting his way back since then and a demon stop vaulted the No. 22 from third to first ahead of Oliver Jarvis’ Mazda, itself up from fifth. Unable to believe his good fortune, the Brazilian eked out a small but key advantage lap by lap…until edged off course while lapping a GT car just before his final pit stop with 45 minutes to go. That left him just a half-second clear of Albuquerque after the final stops were out of the way.Meanwhile, Braun’s consistency had him in fourth place which, with the No. 31 Caddy in eighth, had him poised for a fairytale title…

But…all three were saddled with considerable uncertainty whether they could make the finish on fuel. As was Felipe Nasr in the No. 31. It couldn’t get any more uncertain…Derani gave way to Albuquerque with 25 minutes to go and did his best to chase the No. 5 Cadillac down while also holding off van der Zande — the only one of the leaders without fuel concerns, having made his final planned stop later. To press, or to fuel save?

Braun was the first to concede, making a splash and dash with 9m to go. That dropped him to sixth, but Nasr’s eighth remained shaky, the No. 31 lapping slower than the GTLM cars.Van Der Zande pounced on Derani coming down the hill with six minutes to go, squeaking past to take over second, but Albuquerque remained tantalizingly out of reach 1.3sec up the road. But then a couple of corners from the end, van der Zande flashed last as the Action Express Cadillac ran dry.
“It’s just frustrating. This time I thought we had it…but the trophy’s not mine still,” said Albuquerque.

Instead it was Van Der Zande’s, Taylor’s and Hunter-Reay’s.