'It's not enough to be fast': Ferrari sets Le Mans pace, but prepares for a fight

Five of thdrivers have been promoted from racing in the GTE class, while the sixth, Antonio Giovinazzi, is a Ferrari F1 reserve driver (having raced for Alfa Romeo) and has worked with the team since 2016, forming a group with years of shared experience, despite the Hypercar only making its race debut in the current World Endurance Championship season.

The six have been heavily involved in developing the car from its early days last year, continuing to hone its set-up over the first three races this year, in preparation for Le Mans.

“When it came out the factory for its first run, we were thinking, ‘Oh my God’; it started accelerating itself, the brakes didn’t work and all these sort of things,” says Worcestershire-born James Calado, the only British driver in Ferrari’s line-up. “We were thinking, you know, this is a tricky car to get right.

“But we knew that the performance was there. The numbers from the simulations that we do back in the factory showed that the car had phenomenal potential.

“The guys are working day and night every single day to make this car perform and they’ve given us an amazing car.”

Calado shares the No51 car with Giovinazzi and Alessandro Pier Guidi, who qualified 0.8sec behind the sister car in Thursday’s Hyperpole shootout.

“You look at it like a baby growing up,” said the Italian. “We started from the beginning, spending many hours in the simulator, then all of us were involved in the development programme during the last year. At the end you feel proud of yourself if the car is quick and doing well.

“Three years ago, not one of us expected to be here then, luckily for us, Ferrari decided to come back after such a long period. It’s great to be part of the history of this brand — especially as an Italian driver — we are driving for Ferrari in the right period!”

Ferrari has opted to build a Hypercar, which offers more design freedom than the alternative and cheaper LMDh option — run by Porsche and Cadillac — which requires manufacturers to use certain off-the-shelf components, including the chassis and hybrid system.

So far this season, Hypercars have led the way. Toyota, in its third year of racing its Hypercar, has won all three races, but Ferrari has been next in line, with a podium finish in every race so far, and pole position in its debut race at Sebring.

It has largely all been a dress rehearsal for the prestige of Le Mans. “The car is designed for this track!” says No50 driver Miguel Molina.

While the hopes of Italy and Ferrari’s global fans might be on the drivers, each of them is guarded when it comes to their chances of victory and downplays the importance of pole in a 24-hour race. The team points out that none of its cars has had a trouble-free race yet — and Le Mans is four times longer than those.

“24 hours is long. It’s not enough to be fast,” says Giovinazzi. “To win the reliability needs to be good, we can’t make mistakes and if we can put it together, we can be in a good position in the race.

“I think Toyota sits in front of us. In the race, they are not too fast in terms of pace [but] they have more experience; they have already won a few Le Mans, then in terms of car performance, in terms of tyre wear and degradation they are better.”

“If we can put pressure to them, it’s a long race so is they can make a mistake and then we can use that to be in front of them.”

Toyota may not be the only team in the fight, however. Porsche has shown impressive pace in practice and qualifying, while Peugeot and Cadillac are also closer to the frontrunners.

Their causes were helped last week when Toyota was given a 37kg weight penalty and Ferrari 24kg in a late adjustment to the Balance of Performance rules, which are designed to create closer racing. Rivals benefitted: Cadillac was given 11kg more, Porsche 3kg and Peugeot is unchanged.

Teams have been threatened with sanctions if they criticise the system, and refused to discuss the impact, but it’s clear that several teams are unhappy at the decision and how it could affect the race result.

All will start to be revealed when the flag drops at 3pm (BST) tomorrow and two Ferraris lead the grid across the line.

“You never know what the others have got until we start the race,” says Calado who is already a three-time WEC champion and two-time Le Mans winner in the GTE class. “We know that this race isn’t won on outright lap time, we know it’s about trying to look after the car over 24 hours.”