Audi proved a dominant force...
The 2011 Le Mans 24 hours looks set to be a close-fought contest after last weekend's official test resulted in half a second covering the top five times.
Audi still looks to be the pre-eminent team, however, taking three out of the top four time spots.
The third-placed Peugeot in the hands of Stephane Sarrazin was a mere 0.2secs off the Audi of Tom Kristensen's time of 3m27.7s, however, so the Audis won't have it all their own way.
...but Aston has yet to find form
The works Aston Martin AMR-Ones struggled with engine problems, however, and packed up after just 12 laps of the Circuit de La Sarthe, having posted a best time more than 20 seconds off the pace of the leading Audis.
"We had a cylinder plasma lining failure on 009," reports our source at Aston. "We then ran 007 cautiously, however all our engines are at the same point of development so we retired 007 to protect it. Christian and Darren who got some time in the 007 AMR-One reported good balance, and good progress with the balance and handling of the car."
The fastest petrol-powered runner was the Pescarolo LMP1 contender at 3m37.6s. The British flag was waved by the Zytek of the Greaves team, who put in the fastest LMP2 time, while the fastest of the GTE entries (formerly GT2) was he Ferrari 458 of Allan Simonsen.