The No. 911 Porsche of Kevin Estre and the No. 3 Corvette of Jan Magnussen were knocked out of yesterday’s competition after a hard crash in turn 1. Both Porsche and Corvette were fighting for the lead coming out of turn 17 when the the pair split a GTD Audi down the main straight. Magnussen had the dry line, next to the pit wall, and Estre was on the outside on an extremely wet part of the track. It appeared that Magnussen couldn’t see Estre on the outside and turned in hard to steal first place going into Turn 1. At the same time, Estre, who couldn’t see the Corvette and knowing how tight the battle was, committed to the turn on his wet line and locked his breaks as he attempted to turn-in. The result? Hard contact that sent both cars into the wall and out of the race.
“I was fighting with the Corvette at the entry to [turn] 17, he was on the inside, I was on the outside. We overtook a car so we were three-wide in 17 and we exited three-wide with me on the inside, the Corvette on the outside and an Audi GTD between,” Estre said.
“The Audi, for some reason, stayed a lot to the left so I had just a small space between the wall. The Corvette was on the right somewhere but I was not sure exactly where. I decided to commit and go through [turn] one like this.
“I knew the Audi would brake early and I had the line for one. When I touched the brake there was just too much water on the inside I didn’t see before.
“I locked the front and I hit the Corvette which was on the dry line. It was my fault. I made the wrong decision at that point. I am really sorry for the whole team and for the Corvette. I don’t know if we had the pace in the dry but we definitely had in it in the wet and it was going to rain again.”