2018 Le Mans / IMSA

[Kchrpm]

Didn't anyone else chuckle a bit realizing Montoya binned it at Indianapolis?

*raises hand*

[Freude am Fahren]

Great timing link if anyone's interested:

https://timing.71wytham.org.uk/s/lm24

Ford's 6th channel of their stream is also a good source.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H67V...ordPerformance

[Rare White Ape]

Any noticieable differences so far? My eye's untrained.

Yep. An LMP2 ran off there about two hours ago, and instead of smashing into a million tiny pieces and leaving them on the road, thus leading to an extended slow zone period, it harmlessly crossed the gravel trap and left a much easier mess to clean up and racing continued into the dawn and the world carried on like nothing had mattered.

[Rare White Ape]

If Toyota doesn’t win this one I’m going to flop my dick out.

[Blerpa]

Stellar performances by Alonso and Nakajima that made up 2 minutes of penalty with awesome night driving.
Com'on!
Too bad Bruni got unlucky under SC, damn.

[MR2 Fan]

Toyota finally won! whew, about time!

[FaultyMario]

Can somebody explain the length of stints, drivers stay for as long as they can but cars have to pit every 37 laps for fuel regardless of their other stops?

[Blerpa]

You can criticize Alonso all you want, you can say he was in the best car and with the best team and that Toyota had no real opponents (although I'd say the main opponents in Le Mans 24 Hours are time, fate and yourself)... but can we take our hats off to Alonso and the way he competed? The way him and Nakajima drove during the night?
GT BoP seems a bit fucked, must say, but whatever. At least not Ford neither Corvette won.

[Freude am Fahren]

Can somebody explain the length of stints, drivers stay for as long as they can but cars have to pit every 37 laps for fuel regardless of their other stops?

Drivers can do a maximum of I think 4 hours straight. Typically depending on class they pit every 8-11 laps for fuel, and stay in the car for 2-3 sometimes 4 stints. I think this year, tires were typically double stinted, but may have been put back on later for a 3rd/4th stint?

They also added a maximum stint length this year, which made trying to be clever with strategy non-existent. Nobody liked it.

This is all from memory, and may be slightly off.

[Rare White Ape]

Conveniently, the commentary I was watching addressed this:

A driver must complete a minimum of 6 hours and a maximum of 14 hours throughout the race. To manage fatigue, they shall do no more than 4 hours out of every 6.

LMP1 hybrids are limited to maximum fuel lengths of 11 laps to allow the slower non-hybrids to be competitive by making less pit stops.