The Garage 56 entry prepared by Hendrick Motorsports logged its first laps around the 8.5-mile Circuit de la Sarthe on Sunday. This took place less than a week before the 24 Hours of Le Mans gets underway on Saturday, June 10 at 10 a.m. ET.
There were two sessions held on Test Day. The first took place from 4-7 a.m. ET and the second was from 9:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. ET. In the second session, the No. 24 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 logged its best lap of the day at 3 minutes, 53.761 seconds. According to the 24 Hours of Le Mans website, the car was a full two seconds faster than the top GTs.
"It’s just so cool to be here," Jimmie Johnson said in the video below following his first run on the track. "The experience of being on this track. I wanted to come here and be a part of it.
"This nine-month journey we’ve been on putting the car together. Testing it. Developing it. Traveling here. The buildup to it all. Those opening 10 laps for myself were just insane. What is really neat about this track is that the straightaways are so long, you can actually sit and savor the moment. Each lap I made, it became more real and intense the amount of fun I was having out there. That was incredible."