Cadillac loses Le Mans 24H pole to BMW on a technicality despite fastest lap
Cadillac’s Jack Aitken set the fastest Le Mans Hyperpole lap, edging BMW by 0.005 seconds, but a pit-lane infringement demoted the #38 Cadillac to tenth, handing pole position to BMW’s Dries Vanthoor
A very interesting situation unfolded at the 24 Hours of Le Mans after American automaker Cadillac secured the pole position with the fastest lap during qualifying. Dries Vanthoor took the pole position in the #15 BMW, despite Jack Aitken’s #38 Cadillac posting the fastest lap time. Jack Aitken shared the #38 Cadillac with Sebastien Bourdais and Earl Bamber, setting the pace in Hyperpole 1 to keep the team in contention.
Fastest time not enough to secure pole for Cadillac
The Cadillac posted a lap time of 3:22:559, which was five thousandths of a second over the #15 BMW, which posted a lap time of 3:22:564, making it one of the closest pole position margins in the history of the 24 Hours of Le Mans. However, the pit lane infringement occurred when the Cadillac Team released Aitken too early, therefore not following the race director’s instructions. As part of the punishment, the #38 Cadillac was demoted from pole to tenth on the grid, thereby losing its position to the #15 BMW consisting of Dries Vanthoor, Kevin Magnussen and Raffaele Marciello.
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Will Stevens in the #12 Cadillac secured third position on the grid, positioned right after Vanthoor. However, with the promotion of the #15 BMW car, Stevens secured second position on the grid for the Hypercar field on Saturday.
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One of the Closest Pole Position Margins
Belgian driver Dries Vanthoor had set his sights on the pole position, setting the early pace during qualifying with the #15 BMW. He was the first to post a lap time under 3:23:000 this week, setting an initial lap time of 3:22:745, which he shattered by clocking 3:22:564. This was the fastest lap time that the Belgian had set, and while BMW was heading for pole position with only five minutes left, Jack Aitken snatched the pole position by posting the fastest lap time of 3:22:559 in his flying final lap.
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