Great weather, many incidents and crashes and a dominating win for Peugeot were some of the main stories of the 2009 version of the 24h of Le Mans.
At last Peugoet managed to win the 24h of Le Mans and what a way they did it in. Their main rivals Audi didn't stand a chance with their R15. All three factory 908's were fast but it was the #9 car driven by Marc Gene, David brabham and Alexander Wurz that corssed the finish line first with 382 laps completed, one more then their teammates in the #8 car; Sebastien Bourdais, Franck Montagny and Stephane Sarrazin. The #7 car had a pucnture in the early stages and lost alot of time and was never in contention though they showed awesome speed throughout the race aswell.
The Audis had a tough race and the only Audi that was up there at the end was the #1 car drive by the former winners Tom Kristenson, Rinaldo Capello and Alan McNish. They finished third while the other two factory R15's had a tough 24 hours as they finished way down the order.
The #007 Lola-Aston Martin driven by Jan Charouz, Tomas Enge and Stefan Mucke finished in a fine 4th with the Oreca of Oliver Panis, Nicolas Lapierre and Soheil Ayari in 5th.
Team Essex with it's Porsche RS Spyder won the LMP2 class. Seji Ara, one of the drivers in the other Porsche, had an heavy accident in one of the chicanes at the long Mulsanne straight with about one and a half hour to go of the race. A crash that costed them alot as they were on the way to a potentional top finish in their class. Luckily Ara was unhurt in the big shunt.
Johnny O'Connel, Jan Magnussen and Antonio Garcia won the GT1 class in their Corvette ahead of Luc Alphand, Patrice Goueslard and Stephane Gregoire, also they in a Corvette. In the GT2 class the Ferraris were the dominant force with Jaime Melo, Mika Salo and Pierre Kaffer taking the victory for their team Rizi Competizione. Just as Corvette in the GT1 class Ferrari was the one car make on the podium in GT2.
