The final free practice session before qualifying later today for Sunday’s 2026 edition of Lone Star Le Mans witnessed Aston Martin THOR Team come out on top
Harry Tincknell again set the best lap, after similarly topping the second session yesterday afternoon, stopping the clocks at 1m52.174s in the #007 Valkyrie Hypercar
The closest challenger to the Aston Martin was the #19 Genesis Magma Racing GMR-001 crewed by Daniel Juncadella, Paul-Loup Chatin and Mathieu Jaminet; it was the latter who got to within just 0.004s of Tincknell’s ultimate best
American muscle will be cheered on this weekend with Cadillac, Corvette and Ford represented across the 35-car grid; heading the charge from a US standpoint was the #38 Cadillac Hertz Team Jota entry, as Jack Aitken posted the third-best time at 1m52.435s
The reigning champions took fourth place as James Calado, Antonio Giovinazzi and Alessandro Pier Guidi continue to show strong speed in the #51 Ferrari AF Corse 499P
Next up were the #009 Aston Martin and #12 Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA cars, with just half-a-second covering the top six contenders in the Hypercar category
There was drama 20 minutes in when Nicklas Nielsen in the #50 Ferrari AF Corse 499P suffered damage following contact with the #77 Proton Competition Ford Mustang driven by Ben Tuck
Nielsen pitted for repairs to be carried out on the Ferrari’s left-rear corner; the car returned to the fray and wound up tenth in the final order
Brief contact also occurred between the #83 AF Corse Ferrari and #34 Racing Team Turkey by TF Corvette at the exit of Turn One; Peter Dempsey and Phil Hanson were the drivers fighting over track position and the incident was placed under investigation, but no further action was taken
Loïc Duval had a wild spin in the later stages of the session in the #94 Team Peugeot TotalEnergies 9X8 but was able to continue without damage
LMGT3
Ferrari pushed to the front in the LMGT3 category as the #21 VISTA AF Corse entry piloted by François Hériau, Simon Mann and Alessio Rovera enjoyed a slender advantage of 0.138s, with Mann setting the benchmark time of 2m05.731s
That gap was over the #61 Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG entry, which continued to show very promising pace in the hands of Maxime Martin, Martin Berry and Rui Andrade, as Belgium’s Martin claimed the car’s best lap
Last year’s COTA pole-sitter, Proton Competition showed it will be well in contention again in qualifying later today as the #77 Ford Mustang of Sebastian Priaulx, Eric Powell and Ben Tuck brushed aside the contact with the #51 Ferrari Hypercar to grab third position in-class
The FP2 pace-setting #27 Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin crewed by Ian James, Zacharie Robichon and Mattia Drudi placed fourth, ahead of the leading McLaren
The #10 Garage 59-run 720S shared by Antares Au, Tom Fleming and Marvin Kirchhöfer ensured that five different manufacturers were represented inside the first five positions in LMGT3
Completing the top six was the #23 Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin Vantage, which was just 0.356 shy of the fastest time – emphasising the close fight in the production-based class
Qualifying for Lone Star Le Mans will get underway at 15:00 local time (GMT-5).
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