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Ford GT dominates Le Mans qualifying, gets slapped with performance adjustment

Fifty years after Bruce McLaren and Chris Amon drove the Ford GT40 to victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans, Ford is poised for a historic return to the Circuit de la Sarthe. The new Ford GT took the top two qualifying positions in the LMGTE Pro class, and four of the top five. Ferrari's 488 filled in the rest of the spots in the top seven, the first two from AF Corse. In other words, we're primed for a reboot of the classic Ford-Ferrari feud at this year's race. Or not, as the ACO, which organizes the 24 Hours of Le Mans, announced sweeping pre-race Balance of Performance (BOP) adjustments this morning that make this year's GT class anybody's race. In LMP1, last year's overall winner Porsche locked up the top two spots with the 919 Hybrid and will lead the entire field at race start. Toyota's two-car factory effort followed with qualifying times 1.004 and 2.170 seconds behind the pole lap. Audi rounds out the manufacturer-backed LMP1 class in fifth and sixth. Full qualifying results can be found here. The storyline for the GT cars is perfect - some say too perfect. Ford's class-leading times came after BOP adjustment to the Corvette Racing C7.R before qualifying. BOP is intended to level the playing field in the class by adjusting power, ballast, and fuel capacity. (Check out this explainer video for more, or even just if you love French accents.) But the process is riddled with unknowns and ripe for accusations of sandbagging. That is, if the Ford cars were intentionally slow in practice they could hope for BOP adjustment to improve their race chances. On the Corvette side, last year's GTE Pro winner went from the top of the field to the bottom, barely improving from practice to qualifying. If you think Le Mans is as rigged at the NBA Playoffs, well, it's not that simple. Because if Ford and Ferrari held back until qualifying - the eighth-place Porsche 911 RSR is three-and-a-half seconds off the class pole time - it was a pretty dumb strategy. This morning, the ACO tried to put things back in order by limiting the boost in the Ford GT's twin-turbo V6 and adding 11 pounds of ballast. Ferrari was also given extra weight but allowed more fuel capacity. The Corvette and Aston Martin teams were both given breaks on their air restrictors, which will allow their engines to make more power. Both Ford and Porsche also received extra fuel capacity.

Ferrari threatening to fine journalists $69,000 for breaking LaFerrari embargo?

In automotive journalism, we deal with embargoes on a regular basis. For the uninitiated, these are agreements between publications like Autoblog and manufacturers. While news embargoes (where pubs are provided with information and images and agree to hold until a predetermined date) are fairly common, today, we're focusing on drive embargoes. These are what we generally end up signing when we attend a vehicle launch. Generally, these are in the media's best interest. As drive programs are spread out over a week or two with multiple different "waves" of media, drive embargoes put the biggest and smallest publications on level footing when it comes to publishing reviews.
According to a report from Autocar's Steve Sutcliffe, Ferrari has taken its drive embargo for the LaFerrari hypercar a bit too far. See, initial reviews from the few publications that attended the drive event for the hybrid-powered monster can hit the newsstand or internet on April 30. Originally, syndicated stories - those sold by freelancers or publications to other outlets - couldn't be published until May 12. These syndicated reviews are big money for larger magazines and, in the case of freelance journalists, are a primary source of revenue. Inexplicably, though, Ferrari has pushed the syndication embargo back to May 26, which is bad news for everyone involved (aside from Ferrari).
This could have been nothing more than an annoyance. The stories would still get sold (although it might be for a bit less coin, considering the initial reviews will be nearly a month old) and you'll still be bombarded by reviews of the LaFerrari not once, but twice, just as Ferrari planned.

Coming Ferrari hybrid loaded with twin-turbo V8, three e-motors, 986 hp

One week from now, Ferrari and its best clients will gather in Maranello for a three-day event to introduce a mid-engined hybrid supercar slotting in above the 812 Superfast. A report in Auto, Motor und Sport purports to fill in some of the engine details and power output we've been wondering about. The German magazine says there'll be a twin-turbo V8 amidships, the same 3.9-liter unit from the F8 Tributo, aided by three electric motors. Total output will be 1,000 PS (metric horsepower) — or 986 U.S. horsepower, 197 more horses than found in the 812. One of the electric motors will sit inside the gearbox, the other two will reside at the front axles, powering the front wheels. That means we can expect all-wheel drive and finessed torque vectoring up front. With 36 more horsepower than the system output on the LaFerrari, and AWD, it's claimed that the electrified scarlet star will get from zero to 62 miles per hour in 2 seconds. The FerrariChat forum, which has a 77-page thread on this car, settled on these same specs well before the AMS report. Wrote one poster, "I'm in Geneva and my dealer told me the BB will have 1000hp, V8 with KERS." Another chimed in, "Ferr9000 on a Spanish forum ... said the BB front axle will be electrified, so we can assume there will be two electrics motors on front axle." In FerrariChat parlance, the "BB" stands for "Big Brother" to the 812. Another forum member said he expects the coupe to have a respectable all-electric range, which accords with video of a hybrid 488 mule driving silently at Fiorano. The big question seems to be whether this will be a regular production model or a limited edition, with consensus settling on a proper series production car. AMS puts the price at 600,000 euros, or about $670,000. Yet another FC forum member says there'll be a public debut at Le Mans, the French race taking place June 15-16. Could that provide a clue to the name? And remember, there's plenty more to come from Ferrari this year, with a V6 hybrid sports car slated for debut, and two further cars. One of those additional vehicles is expected to be an 812 Spider.