-Ferrari won the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the third year in a row on Sunday with Poland’s Robert Kubica taking the chequered flag for the customer AF Corse team on a stirring afternoon at the Sarthe circuit.
The ex-Formula One driver’s yellow 83 car, shared with Yifei Ye China’s first winner and Britain’s Phil Hanson, crossed the line after 387 laps in the 93rd edition of the French endurance race.
The number 6 Porsche Penske shared by France’s Kevin Estre, Belgian Laurens Vanthoor and Australian Matt Campbell finished second and 14.084 seconds behind.
The red 51 factory Ferrari of 2023 winners Alessandro Pier Guidi, Antonio Giovinazzi and James Calado completed the podium with last year’s winners Antonio Fuoco, Nicklas Nielsen and Miguel Molina fourth in the number 50 car.
“I finally managed to win it and in Hypercar,” said Kubica of his fifth attempt, his first three in the second tier LMP2 category, to become Poland’s first overall winner since Le Mans was first staged in 1923.
“Great job from everyone… it has not been a smooth one but we deserved it. We have been fast, only a few mistakes which we couldn’t avoid but that’s Le Mans.
“Happy for Ferrari: Three years in a row with three different crews, different cars. Congratulations to them, it’s amazing.”
Ye, who joined Hanson in riding the car into the pit lane, said winning was a dream come true.
“I have to pinch myself, I’m still dreaming,” he said.
AF Corse were the first customer team to win Le Mans since ADT Champion Racing triumphed with an Audi R8 in 2005, giving Denmark’s Tom Kristensen a record seventh win. The Dane would go on to win nine times in total.
Kubica’s triumph came on the same weekend as the Canadian Grand Prix at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, scene of his only Formula One win with BMW Sauber in 2008 after a huge crash at the same track in 2007.
It also capped an astonishing racing redemption story for the 40-year-old whose Formula One career ended after a near-fatal rally crash in Italy in 2011 that partially severed his right forearm.
The race had started with Swiss tennis great Roger Federer waving the French flag to get the race underway on Saturday afternoon, with Porsche immediately seizing the lead from pole-sitters Cadillac.
Cadillac had swept the front row in Thursday’s qualifying but any advantage was short-lived as Porsche Penske’s Julien Andlauer slipstreamed into the lead from third on the grid before the first chicane on the opening lap.
Ferrari worked their way to the front and Fuoco took the lead in the third hour on the run from Mulsanne to Indianapolis with the three Ferraris running 1-2-3 at the quarter distance.
The BMW driven by Italy’s MotoGP great Valentino Rossi had to retire in the LMGT3 category during the night.
The race featured 62 cars shared by 186 drivers from 34 countries, and was the fourth round of the World Endurance Championship .
Organisers put the total weekend attendance at more than 300,000 spectators.
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