24 Hours of LeMans : Jaguar Leads Porsche at the Halfway Point

A Jaguar stubbornly was holding off a charging Porsche at the midway point of the 24 Hours of Le Mans early Sunday morning.

Jan Lammers of the Netherlands and Johnny Dumfries and Andy Wallace of Britain maintained a two-minute lead after 12 hours. They had combined to cover 197 laps over the 8.41-mile circuit, averaging 138.95 m.p.h.

In second place was the Porsche 962 of West Germans Hans Stuck and Klaus Ludwig and Britain’s Derek Bell.

Their Porsche was on the pole at the start and held the lead most of the first 40 laps. But a fuel miscalculation put it two laps behind.

The Porsche then came charging back into contention, moving up from eighth. Earlier in the day, the car had the fastest lap when defending champion Stuck went around the track in 3 minutes 22.50 seconds, averaging 150 m.p.h. That established a lap record during the race, bettering a 3:25.4 set by Dumfries last year.

The Jaguar of Briton Martin Brundle and Dane John Nielsen edged into third, just ahead of the Andretti Porsche driven by Mario, son Michael and nephew John.

“At this point we’re just trying to hang in there,” Michael Andretti said. “We’re trying to be fuel-efficient and not being as quick as we can be.”

Mario Andretti is trying to become the only driver besides Graham Hill of Britain to win the Indianapolis 500, the world Formula One championship and Le Mans.

Porsches were in eight of the next nine places, with West Germany’s John Winter, Denmark’s Franck Jelinski and Sweden’s Stanley Dickens in fifth, five laps back.

The early leading Porsche of Bob Wollek, Sarel Van Der Merwe and Vern Schuppan had to retire just before the 12-hour mark with engine problems.