{"id":735153,"date":"2026-06-14T02:15:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-14T02:15:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/735153\/"},"modified":"2026-06-14T02:15:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-14T02:15:13","slug":"le-mans-24h-h8-safety-car-blows-race-wide-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/735153\/","title":{"rendered":"Le Mans 24h, H8: Safety car blows race wide open"},"content":{"rendered":"

The safety car has blown the 2026 Le Mans 24 Hours wide open, with no fewer than 14 cars gathered in the lead after the eighth hour of racing.<\/p>\n

Up until now, the race had turned into a four-way battle between the #8 Toyota, the #20 BMW, and the #12 and #38 Cadillac, whose driver Earl Bamber has set the fastest lap of the race so far.<\/p>\n

On-track battles featured Jack Aitken (#38 Cadillac) overtaking Sheldon van der Linde (#20 BMW) at the Ford Chicane, while Robin Frijns (#20 BMW) only just held off Sebastien Buemi (#8 Toyota) later on.<\/p>\n

Buemi had a slight edge over his rivals despite slightly shorter stints\u00a0when, at 11:38pm, the GT3 cars of\u00a0Francesco Castellacci (Ferrari #54) and Giammarco Levorato (Ford Mustang #88) collided, with the former stuck in the gravel.<\/p>\n

Race control brought out the safety car, meaning all 14 cars on the lead lap will soon be reunited behind it. That\u2019s all hypercars but the #009 Aston Martin, both Peugeots \u2013 the #93 got a drive-through for a yellow-flag infringement \u2013 and most notably the polesitting #15 BMW, which has been having somewhat of a nightmare race.<\/p>\n

Kevin Magnussen displayed poor pace in the race\u2019s opening stint, and polesetter Dries Vanthoor went on to clip the #3 DKR Engineering LMP2 car in the Porsche curves shortly before 10pm, damaging his right-rear bodywork and ending up with a delaminated tyre. The #15 machine is therefore four laps down by now, and most likely ruled out of victory or podium contention.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the LMP2 category, the #30 Duqueine entry driven by Andlauer-Pin-Verschoor now leads the #343 Inter Europol machine (de Gerus-Garg-Mueller) and the #26 Vector car (Cullen-Fittipaldi-Lomko), with the polesitting #29 entry from Forestier Racing by Panis down to seventh.<\/p>\n

Read Also:<\/p>\n

In GT3, the pecking order remains very tight, as the polesitting #27 Aston Martin (Drudi-James-Robichon) is closely followed by the #74 Ferrari from Kessel Racing, the #21 Ferrari entered by AF Corse, the #77 Ford from Proton Competition and Akkodis ASP\u2019s #87 Lexus.<\/p>\n

Classification after Hour 8 (top 40)<\/p>\n

P
\n#
\nCat
\nTeam
\nCh
\nGap
\nPS<\/p>\n

1
\n8
\nHC
\nToyota Racing
\nTOY
\nLEADER
\n11<\/p>\n

2
\n20
\nHC
\nBMW M Team WRT
\nBMW
\n+2:17.750
\n11<\/p>\n

3
\n12
\nHC
\nCadillac Hertz Team Jota
\nCAD
\n+2:19.797
\n12<\/p>\n

4
\n38
\nHC
\nCadillac Hertz Team Jota
\nCAD
\n+2:22.089
\n11<\/p>\n

5
\n51
\nHC
\nFerrari AF Corse
\nFER
\n+4:03.001
\n10<\/p>\n

6
\n101
\nHC
\nCadillac WTR
\nCAD
\n+4:06.842
\n11<\/p>\n

7
\n50
\nHC
\nFerrari AF Corse
\nFER
\n+4:08.024
\n11<\/p>\n

8
\n7
\nHC
\nToyota Racing
\nTOY
\n+4:10.126
\n10<\/p>\n

9
\n83
\nHC
\nAF Corse
\nFER
\n+4:11.630
\n11<\/p>\n

10
\n19
\nHC
\nGenesis Magma Racing
\nGEN
\n+4:12.607
\n10<\/p>\n

11
\n17
\nHC
\nGenesis Magma Racing
\nGEN
\n+7:03.135
\n10<\/p>\n

12
\n007
\nHC
\nAston Martin Thor Team
\nAST
\n+7:07.427
\n11<\/p>\n

13
\n36
\nHC
\nAlpine Endurance Team
\nALP
\n+7:12.103
\n11<\/p>\n

14
\n35
\nHC
\nAlpine Endurance Team
\nALP
\n+7:13.653
\n11<\/p>\n

15
\n009
\nHC
\nAston Martin Thor Team
\nAST
\n-1 L
\n10<\/p>\n

16
\n94
\nHC
\nPeugeot TotalEnergies
\nPEU
\n+4.505
\n11<\/p>\n

17
\n93
\nHC
\nPeugeot TotalEnergies
\nPEU
\n-2 L
\n10<\/p>\n

18
\n40
\nHC
\nBMW M Team WRT
\nBMW
\n-4 L
\n10<\/p>\n

19
\n30
\nLMP2
\nDuqueine Team
\nORE
\n-6 L
\n10<\/p>\n

20
\n343
\nLMP2
\nInter Europol Competition
\nORE
\n-7 L
\n10<\/p>\n

21
\n26
\nLMP2
\nVector Sport
\nORE
\n+6.024
\n10<\/p>\n

22
\n43
\nLMP2
\nInter Europol Competition
\nORE
\n+3:02.761
\n11<\/p>\n

23
\n9
\nLMP2
\nProton Competition
\nORE
\n+3:06.040
\n11<\/p>\n

24
\n37
\nLMP2
\nCLX Motorsport
\nORE
\n-8 L
\n10<\/p>\n

25
\n13
\nLMP2
\nForester Racing by Panis
\nORE
\n+4.230
\n11<\/p>\n

26
\n24
\nLMP2
\nNielsen Racing
\nORE
\n+2:15.432
\n11<\/p>\n

27
\n14
\nLMP2
\nTDS Racing
\nORE
\n+2:16.523
\n11<\/p>\n

28
\n11
\nLMP2
\nIDEC Sport
\nORE
\n+2:17.610
\n12<\/p>\n

29
\n99
\nLMP2
\nAO by TF
\nORE
\n+2:20.832
\n11<\/p>\n

30
\n22
\nLMP2
\nUnited Autosports
\nORE
\n+2:21.626
\n11<\/p>\n

31
\n4
\nLMP2
\nCrowdstrike Racing by APR
\nORE
\n+6:58.030
\n10<\/p>\n

32
\n25
\nLMP2
\nAlgarve Pro Racing
\nORE
\n-9 L
\n10<\/p>\n

33
\n183
\nLMP2
\nAF Corse
\nORE
\n-10 L
\n11<\/p>\n

34
\n3
\nLMP2
\n\u2014
\nORE
\n+5:33.957
\n11<\/p>\n

35
\n44
\nLMP2
\nProton Competition
\nORE
\n+5:43.170
\n11<\/p>\n

36
\n222
\nLMP2
\nRD Limited
\nORE
\n-12 L
\n11<\/p>\n

37
\n27
\nGT3
\nUnited Autosports
\nORE
\n-16 L
\n11<\/p>\n

38
\n74
\nGT3
\nHeart of Racing Team
\nAST
\n+1.345
\n11<\/p>\n

39
\n21
\nGT3
\nKessel Racing
\nFER
\n+2.465
\n11<\/p>\n

40
\n77
\nGT3
\nVista AF Corse
\nFOR
\n+3.311
\n11<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

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– The Motorsport.com Team<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The safety car has blown the 2026 Le Mans 24 Hours wide open, with no fewer than 14…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":735154,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[346589,64,63,346590,355413,355412,806,805,803,804,85,94075],"class_list":["post-735153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-24-hours-of-le-mans","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-circuit-de-la-sarthe","tag-h8-safety-car-blows-race-wide-open","tag-le-mans-24h","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports","tag-wec"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=735153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/735154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=735153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=735153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=735153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}