If you thought you could take a break from the cruel, unfair realities of this world with a nice day of racing, just remember: Everything is terrible, and there is no justice or fairness in this world. Case in point, the No. 82 Risi Competizione Ferrari just got taken out of Le Mans by an absolutely stupid avoidable crash.
Risi is the Ferrari team responsible for last year’s absolutely epic Ford GT vs. Ferrari battle at Le Mans. That rivalry hasn’t let up in the slightest, and Risi was hungry this year to come back and win. They’re also from Texas and feel like a home team to me, so it’s absolutely gutting to see them out just over five hours into a 24-hour race.
Pierre Kaffer was passing a slower Ferrari going into a chicane on the Mulsanne Straight when the faster No. 28 TDS Racing driven by Matthieu Vaxiviere came up behind him and moved on Kaffer’s inside. As Vaxiviere moved to pass Risi, he drove right into the Ferrari, sending the No. 82 into the wall, where it spun and bounced around.
The No. 28 sat in 12th place at the time, so there’s no real reason to make such a risky move. Fortunately, Kaffer was able to get out of the car under his own power just fine, however, Risi Competizione’s race engineer believes their car is done as a result.
“It was just an amateur error on the LMP2’s part. And it took us out of the race, unfortunately,” said Risi Competizione race engineer Rick Mayer on the WEC live stream.
The crash brought out a lengthy slow zone as marshals cleaned up the yard sale of debris left behind by Risi’s disintegrating Ferrari.
The lone silver lining is that the stewards for Le Mans do seem to be hardcore on cracking down on avoidable contact, so there’s no doubt that the No. 28 will be penalized. The incident remains under investigation for now, per race director Eduardo Freitas.
But it’s proof that life is terrible that the cause of the crash was only lightly damaged and gets to continue, but the guy he straight-up drove into cannot—but that’s racing. Better luck next year, Risi.
UPDATE [3:10 p.m. ET]: Car No. 28, which still has Vaxiviere behind the wheel, has just been handed a seven-minute stop-and-go penalty for the avoidable contact with the No. 82 Ferrari.
That’s a loss of about two laps in time. Don’t mess with Texas.
Hilariously, the No. 28 pits right next to Risi’s garage. This is going to be a very, very awkward stop-and-go penalty.