Six hours and 35 minutes after the start of the race, the #83 Ferrari 499P driven by Robert Kubica hit the No. 15 BMW M Hybrid V8 of Dries Vanthoor as they overtook the #92 Manthey Pure Rxcing BMW GT3 approaching the Mulsanne corner, which sent the Belgian driver into the wall and caused the M4 to retire.
The #83 Ferrari received a 30-second stop-and-go penalty, but managed to stay on the leaders’ lap, keeping it in contention for victory under current rules. the safety car which brings together all the cars in the lead lap when the race is neutralized.
Vanthoor was furious with the commissioners’ decision and expressed his displeasure on X (formerly Twitter): “Thanks for all your messages, I’m fine! Just a little concussion! It’s a bad day for our sport, pushing someone at 300 km/h and receiving a 30 second penalty. Sorry WEC, I don’t have more confidence.”
Team boss Vincent Vosse told Motorsport.com that it was intolerable that the Ferrari that caused the accident could have returned to the front of the field, and that he would have argued in favor of a three or five minute penalty – which would have allowed the car °83 to lose a turn.
“At the end of the day, this is something we will not accept,” declared the Belgian leader. “For me the penalty was very unfair. You are ruining someone’s race. You deserve to be slowed down in some way, much more than being able to fight for the podium again three hours later late.”
Vincent Vosse doesn’t let up after the collision between the #83 Ferrari and the #15 BMW
Photo by: Marc Fleury
However, Vosse has no hard feelings towards Kubica, a former Team WRT driver who won the ELMS and WEC championships in the LMP2 class with the Belgian team in 2021 and 2023 respectively, while finishing second at the 24 Hours of Le Mans last year with his teammates Rui Andrade And Louis Delétraz.
“I’m close to Robert – he drove for us for a few years,” Vosse pointed out. “We won the championship with him last year and he’s someone I respect a lot. I will say I didn’t expect such a thing from him, but I won’t judge him. I will “I’ll calm down first and I’ll probably talk to him about the incident next week.”
“For a sportsman of his level – and he really is a sportsman, because I see him like that – I have to say that, unfortunately, I was disappointed by the situation.”
Let’s just say we learned what not to do next year.
The 24 Hours of Le Mans was disappointing overall for the BMW factory Hypercar team. Marco Wittmann spun the same #15 car on lap 6, while Robin Frijns crashed the #20 car after bouncing off a curb at the Ford chicane at 6:23 p.m. The car returned to the pits in slow motion and returned to the track only 21 hours later to see the checkered flag, without being classified.
Andreas Roos, head of BMW M Motorsport, explained to Motorsport.com that the car could have been returned to the track sooner, but that the German manufacturer did not want to risk further damage before the WEC round in Sao Paulo, July 14.
“Le Mans can still be quite brutal,” Roos added. “The first thing is not to make mistakes, which we didn’t do. There were too many mistakes. That’s how you try to win races today. Unfortunately, we saw that we were fast at one point, but maybe by attacking too hard.”
“We didn’t learn as much about our cars as we hoped because in the end we couldn’t make it through the night with them. Let’s just say we learned what not to do. ‘next year.”
With Heiko Stritzke and Rachit Thukral
