Priaulx proud of his team as Ford says ‘au revoir’

As always, the iconic 24-hour race proved tough for the 61 starters including the No. 67 car of Andy Priaulx and his teammates Harry Tincknell and Jonathan Bomarito, who survived a hectic and highly-competitive event to finish fifth in the LMGTE Pro class.

This was not only the end of a very long FIA World Endurance Championship Super Season, but also the ‘au revoir’ for Ford to its factory Le Mans programme.

‘I always love this race, but this one was very emotional due to Ford pulling out of this programme,’ said Priaulx reflecting after his sixth shot at Le Mans. ‘However, this spurred on all of us Ford GT drivers to try even harder to end our involvement on a high.

‘Sadly this was not to be, but we gave it our all and I want to thank everyone involved with the Ford Chip Ganassi Racing team for four amazing seasons.’

Signs were promising for Priaulx and his teammates as they qualified second, but things did not go their way in the race.

‘Starting from second on the grid was great after a solid qualifying, during which we also worked on a good race set-up, but I don’t think we saw the true pace of our competitors until the race,’ said the Guernsey star.

‘It was a hard race and we were unlucky with safety cars.

‘We could have had five or six LMGTE Pro cars fighting for the win, but we didn’t have the race pace. It was disappointing, but we were in and out of the mix with some strong stints from all of us.

‘The team worked incredibly hard, so I am sad we couldn’t have given the guys a better result.

‘However, that is Le Mans and at the end of the day I am extremely proud of everyone for their hard work.’