Kristensen bid over?

Just three and a half hours into the 2006 Le Mans 24 Hours and Tom Kristensen's bid for a seventh consecutive victory in the classic La Sarthe race could be over after his #7 Audi suffered a mysterious cut out problem.

After leading the early stages of the race in the hands of Allan McNish, a brief half-spin and trip over the kerbing in the final chicane by Rinaldo Capello in the third hour triggered the slow demise of the #7 that resulted in Kristensen bringing the car back to the garage after completing just one lap.

Capello had initially held the lead following his last turn mishap but surrendered the point to teammate Marco Werner on the lap following the third scheduled pitstop of the race as the crew replaced a broken fly screen. But when Capello returned to the track, his expected pursuit of Werner didn't happen and the grandstands stirred when the yellow tipped R10 returned to the pits again long before its scheduled stop.

At this stage Capello handed over to Kristensen, who completed one sub par lap before returning to the pits and being pushed directly into the garage.

As mechanics and media swarmed around the garage, Audi chief Dr Wolfgang Ullrich confirmed to Motors TV that the car had possible ignition problems and would be stationary for some time.

"The driver reported that the engine was cutting out," explained Ullrich. " We had to change the front wind buffer which was hit by a rubber ball but this will take 15-20 minutes."

With the minutes ticking by and the #8 Werner/Biela/Pirro Audi moving ever further away, an eighth Le Mans win for Kristensen now looks highly unlikely while the ears in the Pescarolo pits have collectively pricked in anticipation of more new car bothers for the Joest Audi team.

After unsuccessfully changing the black box, the Audi crew finally cured the problems, which seemed to be restricted to one side of the diesel powered engine, and returned Kristensen to the track a massive seven laps down and out of the top ten.