The rain then eased during the morning, allowing the Ferrari to use its power to better effect, but still the Jaguar would not give up. Despite this, the race order remained fairly constant and at midday the order was still Ferrari, Jaguar, Cunningham, Jaguar, Cunningham, Aston Martin, Gordini and the OSCA as the leading small-engined car. The two remaining Porsches were running slowly, trying to get to the end of the race. The supercharged Aston Martin had been running surprisingly well all race until just after midday when a head-gasket failure caused its retirement. Around 1pm a ferocious squall slowed all the cars to a snail's pace, then the Jaguar drivers began to close the gap again on Trintignant as the track dried.