Driver: Kamui Kobayashi
Car: #7 TOYOTA GAZOO RACING
The fastest ever lap at 24 Heures du Mans

The Japanese driver revealed that he was shocked to find out that he had set a 3m14.791s when he crossed the line at the end of his qualifying run in the first of Thursday evening's two sessions.

"I thought I could do a 3m16s or maybe a 3m15s, but when I saw 3m14s, I thought wow," he said. "I went at the right time on the right tyres and it was correct to go straight after the red flag.

"It was a brilliant lap – no mistakes and no traffic."

Kobayashi's lap eclipsed Neel Jani's 3m16.887s qualifying record on the current configuration of the Le Mans circuit from 2015 and was also the fastest ever in the history of the 24 Hours.

The lap aboard the #7 Toyota TS050 Hybrid was completed at an average speed of 156.52mph.

That meant Kobayashi went faster than Hans Stuck's 156.47mph pole lap for Porsche in 1985, which was set before the two chicanes on the Mulsanne Straight and the one at Dunlop Curve were added to the circuit.