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Darryl O’Young finishes second in class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans

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World Touring Car Championship regular Darryl O’Young claimed second place in the GTE Am class at the 2013 24 Hours of Le Mans on his second attempt at the world’s most famous endurance race.

The ROAL Motorsport driver was competing with the AF Corse team in a Ferrari 458 Italia in the GTE Am class along with Piergiuseppe Perrazini and Lorenze Case and took second place in the class and 27th overall in a challenging race with ever changing weather conditions, and a record time set behind the safety car.

“This week at the Le Mans 24 hour was truly amazing,” said O’Young.

“It is the biggest endurance race in the world and the 250,000 spectators at the event created an amazing atmosphere.

“We focused on having a very clean race as 24 hours is a very long time. The #55 INTERUSH AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia was prepared perfectly by the team and it ran faultlessly. My team mates Perazzini and Case drove very well and it was a pleasure racing together with them.”

The #55 Ferrari was leading the GTE Am class up until the seventh hour of the race, when one of the 12 safety car interventions affected the team’s strategy and saw them fall behind the IMSA Performance Porsche of Raymond Narac, Christophe Bourret and Jean-Karl Vernay and were unable to make up the difference.

“Unfortunately, we had some bad luck under the safety car which threw off our strategy and cost us three minutes. This deficit proved extremely hard to overcome over the next 17 hours, this gap held all the way to the end of the race. It was an intense fight and we all drove to the maximum each and every lap but we couldn’t close to the leaders.”

The race was marred by tragedy early on as the GTE Am class pole sitting Aston Martin Racing Vantage of Allen Simonsen crashed out heavily at Tertre Rouge, with Simonsen later succumbing to his injuries in hospital.

“This race was also very difficult with the passing of my friend Allan Simonsen in the race. His accident was very unfortunate and my thoughts and prayers are with his family, friends, and team-mates.”