Article Summary
- Jack Aitken’s final lap in the #38 Cadillac edged Dries Vanthoor’s BMW by just 0.005s, the smallest pole margin in Le Mans history.
- A pit lane release violation saw the #38 penalised and dropped to 10th, handing pole to the #15 BMW of Vanthoor, Magnussen, and Marciello.
- Cadillac still dominated the session, placing three V-Series.Rs in the top six, while Ferrari and Toyota had sessions to forget.
The 2026 Le Mans 24 Hours Hyperpole session had everything: a pole that changed hands in the final seconds, the tightest margin in the race’s history, and then a penalty that rendered the whole drama moot. Thursday evening at the Circuit de la Sarthe was Le Mans at its most chaotic.
How It Unfolded
Dries Vanthoor set the early pace in Hyperpole 2, with the #15 BMW M Hybrid V8 achieving the first sub-3m23s lap of the entire week — a 3m22.745s. He then improved further to a 3m22.564s, and with five minutes left, nobody else had come within two seconds of the Belgian. BMW looked to be heading for pole at Le Mans for the first time in the hybrid era. Then Jack Aitken found something in the final sector.
Aitken, in the #38 Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA V-Series.R, snatched pole position away by just 0.005s on his final flying lap. The margin — five thousandths of a second over 13.6 kilometers — is, according to reports from the circuit, the closest pole position margin in Le Mans history. Aitken shares the car with Sébastien Bourdais and New Zealander Earl Bamber, who had set the pace throughout Hyperpole 1 to keep the #38 in contention.
Will Stevens made it a Cadillac 1-3 with a 3m23.078s in the sister #12 entry of Stevens, Louis Delétraz, and Norman Nato, followed by the #35 Alpine of Antonio Felix da Costa in fourth and Robin Frijns’ #20 BMW in fifth.
A Penalty Changed Everything
The celebrations at Hertz Team JOTA did not last long. The #38 was placed under investigation after the session, and the stewards ultimately found against them: the #38 entry was penalized, demoting the car to 10th on the grid. The #15 BMW was consequently promoted to pole position. The infringement was a pit lane release violation — the car left too early.
The #15 crew — Vanthoor, Kevin Magnussen, and Raffaele Marciello — will line up at the front of the Hypercar field on Saturday.
Frijns Had A Difficult Night
BMW’s #20 ended up fourth despite the team’s aspirations. Robin Frijns was candid about his own performance: “It was the goal to be in the top five, and in the end we are in P4. That means we are a bit out of the jungle at the start, which is good. But my lap times were pretty far off. I wasn’t so happy with my runs in Hyperpole 2. I’m not where I should be, so we need to see where we can improve for the race.”
Fourth for the #20 is a solid grid slot. But Frijns is right that there is a gap to find, and at Le Mans that kind of honesty matters — the cars that underperform in qualifying and improve in the race are often the ones to watch come Sunday morning.
