Spa WEC: Toyota almost 3s clear of privateers in FP3
Toyota established a buffer of nearly three seconds over the best of the LMP1 privateers in Friday morning practice for this weekend's Spa FIA World Endurance Championship round.
At the wheel of the #7 Toyota TS050 Hybrid, Kamui Kobayashi pumped in a 1m54.105s with 36 minutes left on the clock, beating last year's quickest qualifying time by three tenths.
That was enough to best the early-session benchmark laid down by Kazuki Nakajima in the #8 car, a 1m56.351s, by a full 2.2s.
Nakajima coasted back to the pits on electrical power only shortly after that, as Toyota simulated running out of fuel.
SMP Racing, which topped Thursday's running, cemented itself as the non-hybrid LMP1 squad to beat by locking out third and fourth positions behind the Toyotas.
Egor Orudzhev recorded the Russian squad's best time in the #17 BR Engineering BR1-AER, which was repaired overnight after Stephane Sarrazin's crash in FP2, a 1m56.842s.
WEC newcomer Stoffel Vandoorne posted the best time in the #11 car, a further six tenths back, ahead of the two Rebellion R-13 Gibsons.
Bruno Senna recorded the Swiss outfit's best time of 1m57.816s in the #1 car to go 1.8s up on the #3 machine of Nathanael Berthon.
G-Drive Racing was best of the LMP2 runners and seventh overall, thanks to a time of 2m01.143s by Jean-Eric Vergne in the team's Aurus-branded Oreca.
Will Stevens was seventh tenths down in the newly-reliveried #38 Jackie Chan DC Racing Oreca, while Gabriel Aubry was third fastest in the sister #37 car.
The ByKolles LMP1 ended up slower than the entire LMP2 field, as Paolo Ruberti spent the majority of the hour-long session at the wheel of the Gibson-powered ENSO CLM P1/01.
Porsche and Ford locked out the top four positions in GTE Pro between them.
Gianmaria Bruni left it late to set the class benchmark of 2m13.945s in the #91 Porsche 911 RSR, beating Harry Tincknell's best effort in the #67 Ford GT by a little over two tenths.
The points-leading #92 Porsche, driven by Kevin Estre, was third ahead of Olivier Pla's #66 Ford and the two AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTEs.
Aston Martin could only manage seventh and ninth with its pair of Vantage GTEs despite leading the class early on, sandwiching the quicker of the BMW M8 GTEs.
Matteo Cairoli set the best time in GTE Am, a 2m15.190s, to beat Proton Porsche teammate Matt Campbell by 0.190s.
Third practice results:
| Cla | # | Drivers | Car | Class | Time |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 7 |  Mike Conway  Kamui Kobayashi  Jose Maria Lopez | Toyota TS050 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'54.105 |
| 2 | 8 |  Sébastien Buemi Kazuki Nakajima  Fernando Alonso | Toyota TS050 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'56.351 |
| 3 | 17 |  Stéphane Sarrazin  Egor Orudzhev Sergey Sirotkin | BR Engineering BR1 | LMP1 | 1'56.842 |
| 4 | 11 | Mikhail Aleshin Vitaly Petrov  Stoffel Vandoorne | BR Engineering BR1 | LMP1 | 1'57.475 |
| 5 | 1 | Neel Jani  Andre Lotterer  Bruno Senna | Rebellion R13 | LMP1 | 1'57.816 |
| 6 | 3 | Nathanael Berthon Thomas Laurent  Gustavo Menezes | Rebellion R13 | LMP1 | 1'59.664 |
| 7 | 26 | Roman Rusinov  Job Van Uitert Jean-Eric Vergne | Aurus 01 | LMP2 | 2'01.143 |
| 8 | 37 |  David Heinemeier Hansson Jordan King Will Stevens | Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 2'01.826 |
| 9 | 38 |  Ho-Pin Tung Gabriel Aubry  Stéphane Richelmi | Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 2'02.830 |
| 10 | 31 |  Roberto Gonzalez  Pastor Maldonado Anthony Davidson | Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 2'02.969 |
| 11 | 28 | François Perrodo Matthieu Vaxiviere Norman Nato | Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 2'03.073 |
| 12 | 29 | Frits van Eerd Giedo van der Garde Nyck de Vries | Dallara P217 | LMP2 | 2'03.400 |
| 13 | 36 | Nicolas Lapierre Andre Negrao Pierre Thiriet | Alpine A470 | LMP2 | 2'03.866 |
| 14 | 50 | Erwin Creed Romano Ricci Nicholas Boulle | Ligier JSP 217 | LMP2 | 2'05.587 |
| 15 | 4 | Tom Dillmann Oliver Webb  Paolo Ruberti | ENSO CLM P1/01 | LMP1 | 2'05.697 |
| 16 | 91 |  Richard Lietz Gianmaria Bruni | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE PRO | 2'13.722 |
| 17 | 67 |  Andy Priaulx Harry Tincknell | Ford GT | LMGTE PRO | 2'13.945 |
| 18 | 92 | Michael Christensen Kevin Estre | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE PRO | 2'14.264 |
| 19 | 66 | Stefan Mücke Olivier Pla | Ford GT | LMGTE PRO | 2'14.480 |
| 20 | 71 | Davide Rigon Sam Bird | Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE PRO | 2'14.526 |
| 21 | 51 | Alessandro Pier Guidi James Calado | Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE PRO | 2'14.617 |
| 22 | 97 | Alex Lynn Maxime Martin | Aston Martin Vantage AMR | LMGTE PRO | 2'14.695 |
| 23 | 82 | Augusto Farfus  Antonio Felix da Costa | BMW M8 GTE | LMGTE PRO | 2'14.859 |
| 24 | 95 | Marco Sorensen Nicki Thiim | Aston Martin Vantage AMR | LMGTE PRO | 2'15.149 |
| 25 | 88 | Gianluca Roda Giorgio Roda Matteo Cairoli | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE AM | 2'15.190 |
| 26 | 77 | Christian Ried Riccardo Pera  Matt Campbell | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE AM | 2'15.380 |
| 27 | 81 | Martin Tomczyk Nick Catsburg | BMW M8 GTE | LMGTE PRO | 2'15.439 |
| 28 | 56 | Jörg Bergmeister Patrick Lindsey  Egidio Perfetti | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE AM | 2'15.595 |
| 29 | 90 |  Salih Yoluc Euan Hankey  Charles Eastwood | Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE AM | 2'16.273 |
| 30 | 98 |  Paul Dalla Lana Pedro Lamy Mathias Lauda | Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE AM | 2'16.316 |
| 31 | 70 | Motoaki Ishikawa Olivier Beretta Eddie Cheever III | Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 2'16.829 |
| 32 | 54 | Thomas Flohr Francesco Castellacci Giancarlo Fisichella | Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 2'16.843 |
| 33 | 61 | Luis Perez Companc Matteo Cressoni Matthew Griffin | Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 2'16.946 |
| 34 | 86 | Michael Wainwright Benjamin Barker Thomas Preining | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE AM | 2'18.157 |
| View full results | |||||
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About this article
| Series | WEC |
| Event | Spa-Francorchamps (2019) |
| Author | Jamie Klein |
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