24H of Le Mans : A studious first test for the Alpine A450

Ten days after a positive Test Day, the Alpine A450 has returned to La Sarthe for the first official timed sessions ahead of the 2013 Le Mans 24 Hours. Pierre Ragues only covered five laps during free practice, whilst the intended programme for qualifying was not able to be completed as a red flag interrupted proceedings shortly after midway through the two-hour session.

“We had decided beforehand that we would go for a quick lap time at the end of the session,” explained Signatech Alpine Team Principal Philippe Sinault, “but evidently the red flag prevented us from fulfilling our programme. Only Nelson Panciatici and Tristan Gommendy were able to take to the circuit in the evening. It was vital that Tristan got some track time in the Alpine A450 in the dry, and he duly achieved that. Now we have two more qualifying sessions tomorrow to move up the order...”

Having set the 16th-best time overall (and eighth-fastest in the LMP2 class), Nelson Panciatici was disappointed that he had not had the opportunity to demonstrate the full potential of the Alpine A450: “We began the session on part-worn tyres and full tanks in order to continue to work on our race set-up. We wanted to settle in before attempting to set a representative lap time, but the red flag unfortunately meant we were unable to complete our programme. We will have to keep our eyes on the sky now in the hope that the track remains dry tomorrow, because I am convinced we have the ability to set a quick time!”

“It was good to get back out on-track again,” acknowledged Tristan Gommendy. “There was a lot of traffic out there and, at night, it is always more difficult to establish solid reference points. I found that the car was under-steering quite a lot, so now we will conduct a full debrief in order to perfect the set-up of the Alpine A450 before the race.”

On Thursday, there will be two further qualifying sessions from 7pm until 9pm, and from 10pm until midnight. The starting grid for the race will be determined by the best lap times set over the course of the three qualifying sessions.

Full team release here