The Pegasus Racing Team Total-entered Morgan-Nissan LM P2 finished the Le Mans 24 Hours for the second year running. Ho-Pin Tung, David Cheng and Léo Roussel brought no. 29 home after what was far from being a stroll in the park! Last year, the Strasbourg-based team was tenth and this year it saw the flag in ninth place in class. But more than the result the squad clearly showed its increasing momentum in the 83rd running of the greatest endurance race in the world. So it will set its sights even higher for the 84th event next year.
On Wednesday free practice and the first qualifying session were devoted to finding the optimum race setup. The next day the quest for outright performance continued and the no. 29 Morgan-Nissan LM P2 was sixth-fastest in the second part of qualifying. In the third the car suffered a slight lack of power, and taking into account the three sessions, Pegasus Racing qualified in 11th place out of the 19 entries in the baby prototype category, and 21st on the grid.
Saturday’s warm-up proved that the work done on Thursday and Friday had borne fruit. At 15h00, Léo Roussel took the first stint in front of the 263 500 spectators massed around the long Le Mans circuit. Unfortunately, after only three laps he had to pit because of a failure of the obligatory telemetry system. In addition, the team was hit with a stop and go penalty and no. 29 was at the back of the field at the end of the first hour.
The following hours were marked with other glitches: a puncture forced Roussel to cover a full lap of the circuit at a snail’s pace; two wheels became loose, another came off; the telemetry began to act up again and the mechanics had to intervene twice because of problems with the exhaust. In addition there were two off-course excursions and a minor contact with another contender. When it wasn’t held up the car put in a string of quick laps, which helped it to climb up to 11th place in the LM P2 classification with four hours to go to the chequered flag. Thanks to good stints by the drivers the Morgan-Nissan fought its way up to ninth in the category and 19th spot overall.
David Cheng: “we finish the 24 Hours which is a great feeling. When the car crosses the line it is a victory in itself. Of course we could have finished higher up but this year, I think we got the worst luck straight out. Coming back was a huge team effort. To me it is less about the result and more about how the whole team worked together. The car was well prepared but it is part of racing, sometimes, things break! “
Ho-Pin Tung: “I think it was a race in which everyone in the team showed their character and their spirit, which is to never give up. We had a lot of issues in the beginning, many of them out of our control. It is frustrating to start a long race like this but on the other hand, we made a great recovery during 24 hours. Our main objective was to finish and we did so, one place better than what the team did last year, so it’s a great achievement for the drivers and the team and a reward for hard work.“
Léo Roussel: “Overall, we’re feeling pretty satisfied as we came from a long way back. At the beginning of the race we were lying 53rd out of 55 cars and in this kind of situation you see the really closely-knit teams. Nobody ever gave up from the first to the last lap. I can only thank them as they did an amazing job.”
Julien Schell (Team Manager): “It’s our second finish at Le Mans. The level was much higher than last year as at least twelve cars could have won. You have to remain humble even when you are well prepared for what is a very tough race. You need luck to finish and zero problems to finish in the top five, which we were aiming for at the start. This year as in 2014 we learned a lot and we’ve improved enormously in terms of performance, organisation, management, and presentation of the team. We’ve increased the personnel from fourteen to twenty-three and our team is more solid. Reliable partners have joined us and they’ve helped us move up a step. We’re gathering momentum and in 2016 our aim is to fight at the front. A big thank you to everybody!”»