24 Hours Le Mans 2017 Part 12

The 85th 24 Hours of Le Mans (French: 85e 24 Heures du Mans) was a 24-hour automobile endurance event held for Le Mans Prototype (LMP) and Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance (LMGTE) cars from 17 to 18 June 2017 at the Circuit de la Sarthe, near Le Mans before 258,500 spectators. The 85th running of the race, organised by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest, was the third of nine rounds in the 2017 FIA World Endurance Championship.

It was won by a Porsche 919 Hybrid driven by Earl Bamber, Timo Bernhard and Brendon Hartley, which took the lead in the final two hours. The race was Bamber and Bernhard's second Le Mans victory, Hartley's first, and Porsche's 19th. Toyota's Sébastien Buemi, Anthony Davidson and Kazuki Nakajima finished eighth in a TS050 Hybrid after starting second, and were the only other competitors in the Le Mans Prototype 1 (LMP1) field to complete the event. The Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) category was won by Oliver Jarvis, Thomas Laurent and Ho-Pin Tung in Jackie Chan DC Racing's Oreca 07-Gibson; they led the race for almost two hours before finishing second overall. The second DC Racing entry of David Cheng, Tristan Gommendy and Alex Brundle were three laps behind in third place overall, followed by the Signatech Alpine of André Negrão, Nelson Panciatici and Pierre Ragues.

Aston Martin won the Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance Professional (LMGTE Pro) category after the Aston Martin Vantage shared by Jonathan Adam, Daniel Serra and Darren Turner overtook the stricken Chevrolet Corvette C7.R driven by Antonio García, Jan Magnussen and Jordan Taylor in the final two laps. A Ford GT also passed the Corvette on the final lap to take second place for Pipo Derani, Andy Priaulx, and Harry Tincknell. The Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance Amateur (LMGTE Am) was won by a JMW Motorsport Ferrari 488 GTE driven by Robert Smith, Will Stevens and Dries Vanthoor. Ferraris also finished second and third, with Spirit of Race's Marco Cioci, Duncan Cameron and Aaron Scott second and Scuderia Corsa's Townsend Bell, Cooper MacNeil and Bill Sweedler in third place.

The result moved Bamber, Bernhard and Hartley to the World Endurance Drivers' Championship lead with 83 points, ahead of previous leaders Buemi, Nakajima and Davidson. Jarvis, Laurent and Tung moved to third after their LMP2-class victory. Derani, Priaulx and Tincknell remained atop the GT World Endurance Drivers' Championship with Adam, Serra and Turner's category win moving them to second. Porsche overtook Toyota to lead the World Manufacturers' Championship by 28.5 points, as Ford passed Ferrari for the GT World Endurance Manufacturers' Championship lead with six races left in the season.