YART’s Yamaha N.1 was the fastest in the first qualifying practice session for the 24 Hours of Le Mans motorcycles on Thursday, placing itself from the outset as one of the big favorites for the final victory on Sunday.
His crew, made up of the Italian Niccolo Canepa, the German Marvin Fritz and the Czech Karel Hanika, were EWC world endurance champions last year. The 24 Hours of Le Mans Motos is the first of four rounds on the 2024 championship calendar.
The other favorite machines for the race are the Honda N.5 of the F.C.C TSR Honda France, the BMW N.37 of the Motorrad Racing Team and the Suzuki N.12 of the SERT but other teams can do well in the event of mechanical problems for the fastest.
The F.C.C TSR Honda driven by the French Mike Di Meglio and Alan Techer and the Australian Josh Hook triumphed here last year ahead of the YART Yamaha and the Motorrad Racing Team BMW.
Contested under beautiful sunshine, this test session nevertheless saw numerous falls for this return to the track of competitors in the world motorcycle endurance championship. Karel Hanika but also the Frenchman Randy de Puniet on the other Yamaha of Team KM99 and the Briton Dan Linfoot on the Suzuki of SERT thus went to the mat but without damage to the riders and their machines.
We will have to wait until the 2nd qualifying practice session on Friday to determine the starting grid for the race, the start of which will be given on Saturday at 3:00 p.m. This is established by averaging the times of the two fastest drivers from each team during the two sessions.