The #8 GR010 was quickest in the hands of Brendon Hartley, who led AF Corse’s James Calado in the #51 Ferrari 499P and teammate Robert Kubica in the #81 entry.

Alpine showed promise with Mick Schumacher fourth fastest in the #36 A424 while Porsche’s Kevin Estre made it four manufacturers inside the top five behind the wheel of the #6 963 that he’ll share with Australia’s Matt Campbell.

“It was very nice to be back in the GR010 Hybrid at Le Mans,” said Hartley, whose best time of 3:26.246s came on just his second lap of the circuit in Free Practice 2.

“I think we are feeling positive after a successful day with no major dramas. I had a good feeling with the car, and I think Ryo [Hirakawa] and Seb[astien Buemi] did too.

“Clearly the competition is fierce, and on long runs I wouldn’t say we look like the quickest car, but I feel like we are in the fight.

“We have some work to do next week. Hopefully get some good sleep in the next nights, recharge and be ready for the big job to come.”

Less than two seconds covered first through 13th with BMW and Cadillac both inside the top 10.

There were three red flags during the second practice. The first was caused by Sheldon van der Linde who stopped his #20 BMW M Hybrid at the Porsche Curves two hours into the session.

Proton Competition’s Giorgio Roda crashed the #11 Oreca LMP2 at Indianapolis, which caused a half-hour delay to proceedings with just under three-quarters of an hour left in the session.

Australian Brenton Grove crashed the #63 Mercedes-AMG by Iron Lynx exiting the Porsche Curves with five minutes to go, which brought the second practice to a premature end.

Peugeot and Aston Martin had a tough start to their campaign, locking out the bottom four places.

All four cars were more than three seconds off the best lap by Hartley in the Toyota GR010. The #94 9X8 was the slowest entry in the 21-car Hypercar field, 3.194s off the pace.

“The track was quite good from the start, with decent grip,” said Loic Duval.

“We went through our planned test program with different slick tires and various car setups.

“We also did long runs and completed the number of stints we aimed for on a single set of tyres to prepare for the race.

“The car has a good balance, but we’re still lacking performance. It’s up to us to extract the most from our package.”

The 24 Hours of Le Mans gets underway in earnest on Wednesday, June 11 with practice and qualifying. Practice 1 gets underway at 10pm AEST.

CLICK HERE for Free Practice 1 results

CLICK HERE for Free Practice 2 results