Tyre blow-out stymies Larbre Competition�s Le Mans progress

A puncture checked Larbre Competition’s progress as Saturday gave way to Sunday at this year’s Le Mans 24 Hours where the French squad is currently running 11th in the highly competitive LMP2 class.The left-rear tyre blew out at the first chicane on the Mulsanne Straight, which forced Ricky Taylor to crawl back around a significant portion of the 8.4-mile Circuit de la Sarthe in an effort to avoid the flailing rubber from causing too much damage.But although he was able to get back to the pits, the Morgan-Judd’s rear bodywork had not escaped unscathed and would need replacing, costing further precious time. Once repaired, the American returned to the track for another stint before handing over to co-driver Pierre Ragues, who remains behind the wheel.Earlier, Keiko Ihara had also completed a mistake-free stint before swapping with Taylor after the third of this year’s Safety Car periods. Pierre Ragues: “I enjoyed close to three trouble-free stints earlier in the evening. Of course, we had to deal with the Safety Car periods as well as the setting sun, which slightly blinded me on the way back to Indianapolis from Mulsanne. But I’m quite happy with the car, which is performing well.”Ricky Taylor: “We had a blow-out at the first Mulsanne chicane which damaged a lot of pieces on the car, but the team did a fantastic job to put it back together quickly. It felt pretty much back to normal when I went back out so we could continue our race without any problems.”


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