AF Corse’s Ferrari number 83, with Prancing Horse’s official drivers Yifei Ye, Robert Shwartzman, and Robert Kubica, led the race until the eighth hour. The official Ferrari – AF Corse team’s two 499Ps were consistently in the top positions. Indeed, car number 50, crewed by Antonio Fuoco, Miguel Molina, and Nicklas Nielsen, was in second for a long time.
However, the yellow-liveried Ferrari lost the lead after midnight when the 499P—driven by Kubica—collided with the number 15 BMW at 10:40 p.m., with the Ferrari receiving a 30-second penalty at its 14th pit stop.
Meanwhile, intermittent rain throughout the night impacted the teams’ strategies and caused a few off-track incidents from which the drivers emerged unhurt. Heavier rainfall led to a long Safety Car period (from 3:44 to 9 a.m.) because of poor visibility and aquaplaning when the Hypercars, contending for victory, had completed 169 laps. When the race resumed, the Porsche number 6 was ahead, with the 499P number 83 (driven by Kubica) in fifth. The number 50, driven by Nielsen, was sixth, and the number 51 Hypercar with Giovinazzi was eleventh.