Fighting back, then a late retirement to save the car

We qualified 12th, but the water pump belt came off on the way to the grid. The car had to go back to the pits before the race had even started, and we joined about seven minutes down. Chris Knight was straight on the pace, with a 1:46.840 on lap 10, but a second unplanned stop forty minutes in cost another seven minutes. At the first hour we were 53rd overall and 14th in class.

What followed was a long recovery. Through a race with a red flag and around a dozen safety car periods, the four drivers worked the car back up the order: 26th overall and 8th in class by four hours, and 23rd overall by the nine-hour mark on Sunday morning. With under an hour to go, the clutch slave cylinder was failing and the car was struggling to change gear. With Chris Fellows in for the final stint, the team chose to retire the car at around 14:09 on lap 288 to protect it. We were still classified, 48th overall and 14th in class.