Bahrain WEC: Toyota tops red-flagged opening practice
Toyota led the way in the opening practice session of the Bahrain FIA World Endurance Championship season finale, which was interrupted by a lengthy stoppage for an oil spill.
#7 Toyota Gazoo Racing Toyota TS050-Hybrid: Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi, Jose Maria Lopez
JEP / Motorsport Images
The 90-minute afternoon session was brought to a halt with 59 minutes remaining, when the #67 Ford GT of Harry Tincknell suffered an oil leak, eventually coming to a halt at Turn 5.
It took 36 minutes for the track to be cleaned for the session to resume, at which point it was decided to extend the session by a further half-hour to make up for the lost running.
An early lap of 1m42.313s for Mike Conway in the #7 Toyota TS050 Hybrid was good enough to top of the session by 0.109s from the sister #8 car, whose best time was set by Sebastien Buemi.
The two Porsche 919 Hybrids were third and fourth, with Neel Jani putting the #1 third with a 1m42.647s ahead of Timo Bernhard in the title-winning #2 car.
Nelson Piquet Jr led the LMP2 class with a best time of 1m48.707s in the #13 Rebellion Oreca.
LMP2 newcomer Loic Duval put the #26 G-Drive car in second, 0.022s further back, while Alex Brundle put the best of the Jota-run Jackie Chan DC Racing cars third.
The points-leading #31 Rebellion entry was slowest in class, almost two seconds slower than the sister car.
In GTE Pro, a 1m58.579s from championship leader Alessandro Pier Guidi put the #51 AF Corse Ferrari on top by just over three tenths from the best of the Aston Martins, the #97 of Jonathan Adam.
After its oil leak, the #67 Ganassi-run Ford GT recovered to take third in class with Tincknell at the wheel, helped by the session being extended.
In fifth was the best of the Porsches was the #91 of Richard Lietz, who along with Frederic Makowiecki lies just two points behind Pier Guidi and James Calado in the race for the GTE Pro drivers' title.
Porsche topped the GTE Am division courtesy of Matteo Cairoli, who set a best time of 2m00.428s in the #77 Dempsey Proton car.
Practice results:
Pos. | # | Drivers | Car | Class | Time | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 7 | Kamui Kobayashi Mike Conway Jose Maria Lopez |
Toyota TS050 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'42.313 | |
2 | 8 | Anthony Davidson Kazuki Nakajima Sébastien Buemi |
Toyota TS050 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'42.512 | 0.199 |
3 | 1 | Andre Lotterer Neel Jani Nick Tandy |
Porsche 919 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'42.647 | 0.334 |
4 | 2 | Timo Bernhard Brendon Hartley Earl Bamber |
Porsche 919 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'42.813 | 0.500 |
5 | 13 | Nelson Piquet Jr. David Heinemeier Hansson Mathias Beche |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'48.707 | 6.394 |
6 | 26 | Loic Duval Roman Rusinov Leo Roussel |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'48.729 | 6.416 |
7 | 37 | David Cheng Tristan Gommendy Alex Brundle |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.083 | 6.770 |
8 | 36 | Nicolas Lapierre Andre Negrao Gustavo Menezes |
Alpine A470 | LMP2 | 1'49.107 | 6.794 |
9 | 24 | Jean-Eric Vergne Ben Hanley Matt Rao |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.272 | 6.959 |
10 | 28 | François Perrodo Emmanuel Collard Matthieu Vaxiviere |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.730 | 7.417 |
11 | 38 | Oliver Jarvis Ho-Pin Tung Thomas Laurent |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.854 | 7.541 |
12 | 25 | Vitaly Petrov Simon Trummer Roberto Gonzalez |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'50.041 | 7.728 |
13 | 31 | Bruno Senna Julien Canal Nicolas Prost |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'50.467 | 8.154 |
14 | 51 | James Calado Alessandro Pier Guidi |
Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE PRO | 1'58.579 | 16.266 |
15 | 97 | Darren Turner Jonathan Adam |
Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE PRO | 1'58.901 | 16.588 |
16 | 67 | Harry Tincknell Andy Priaulx |
Ford GT | LMGTE PRO | 1'59.413 | 17.100 |
17 | 66 | Stefan Mücke Olivier Pla |
Ford GT | LMGTE PRO | 1'59.457 | 17.144 |
18 | 91 | Richard Lietz Frédéric Makowiecki |
Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE PRO | 1'59.510 | 17.197 |
19 | 92 | Michael Christensen Kevin Estre |
Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE PRO | 1'59.657 | 17.344 |
20 | 95 | Marco Sorensen Nicki Thiim |
Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE PRO | 2'00.006 | 17.693 |
21 | 77 | Christian Ried Matteo Cairoli Marvin Dienst |
Porsche 911 RSR (991) | LMGTE AM | 2'00.428 | 18.115 |
22 | 71 | Sam Bird Davide Rigon |
Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE PRO | 2'00.473 | 18.160 |
23 | 98 | Pedro Lamy Paul Dalla Lana Mathias Lauda |
Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE AM | 2'00.553 | 18.240 |
24 | 86 | Michael Wainwright Ben Barker Nick Foster |
Porsche 911 RSR (991) | LMGTE AM | 2'00.947 | 18.634 |
25 | 61 | Matt Griffin Mok Weng Sun Keita Sawa |
Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 2'01.572 | 19.259 |
26 | 54 | Francesco Castellacci Miguel Molina Thomas Flohr |
Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 2'01.680 | 19.367 |
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