Bahrain WEC: Toyota completes sweep of Thursday practices
Toyota maintained its edge over Porsche in the second free practice session for the final round of the FIA World Endurance Championship season in Bahrain.
#7 Toyota Gazoo Racing Toyota TS050-Hybrid: Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi, Jose Maria Lopez
JEP / Motorsport Images
As in the first session, all the best times were set early on, with the cooler temperatures of the evening ensuring that laptimes were comfortably quicker than in the afternoon.
Mike Conway's FP1 benchmark of 1m42.313s was beaten straight away by Kazuki Nakajima, who put the #8 Toyota at the top of the times on a 1m40.095s.
Jose Maria Lopez was 0.598s slower in the sister #7 TS050 Hybrid, completing another one-two for the Japanese marque as it seeks a third successive WEC victory.
Best of the Porsche drivers was newly-signed Toro Rosso Formula 1 driver Brendon Hartley, who posted a 1m40.773s in the #2 919 Hybrid, a little over a tenth quicker than Nick Tandy's effort in the #1 car.
There was late drama for the #2 car however when it was placed under investigation at the end of the session when Earl Bamber and Leo Roussel made contact on-track at Turn 11.
In LMP2, the points-leading #31 Rebellion Oreca set the pace, Bruno Senna becoming the only driver in class to dip into the 1m47s with a best time of 1m47.664s.
Nelson Piquet Jr made it a Rebellion one-two in the #13 machine, six tenths slower than his compatriot, while best of the rest was Thomas Laurent in the #38 Jackie Chan DC Racing Oreca.
Aston Martin locked out the top two places in GTE Pro division on the final race for its current-model Vantage, with Jonathan Adam putting the #97 car on top with a best time of 1m57.014s.
That was four tenths faster than Marco Sorensen could muster in the sister #95 car.
Ferraris were third and fourth, with Davide Rigon delivering the Italian marque's best laptime in the #71 car, ahead of the two Ganassi-run Ford GTs and the two Porsche 911 RSRs.
Leading the way in GTE Am was the Clearwater Racing-run Ferrari, thanks to a 1m59.773s lap from Matt Griffin.
Practice results:
Pos. | # | Drivers | Car | Class | Time | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 8 | Anthony Davidson Kazuki Nakajima Sébastien Buemi |
Toyota TS050 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'40.095 | |
2 | 7 | Kamui Kobayashi Mike Conway Jose Maria Lopez |
Toyota TS050 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'40.693 | 0.598 |
3 | 2 | Timo Bernhard Brendon Hartley Earl Bamber |
Porsche 919 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'40.773 | 0.678 |
4 | 1 | Andre Lotterer Neel Jani Nick Tandy |
Porsche 919 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'40.855 | 0.760 |
5 | 31 | Bruno Senna Julien Canal Nicolas Prost |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'47.664 | 7.569 |
6 | 13 | Nelson Piquet Jr. David Heinemeier Hansson Mathias Beche |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'48.238 | 8.143 |
7 | 38 | Oliver Jarvis Ho-Pin Tung Thomas Laurent |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.022 | 8.927 |
8 | 36 | Nicolas Lapierre Andre Negrao Gustavo Menezes |
Alpine A470 | LMP2 | 1'49.029 | 8.934 |
9 | 26 | Loic Duval Roman Rusinov Leo Roussel |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.083 | 8.988 |
10 | 28 | François Perrodo Emmanuel Collard Matthieu Vaxiviere |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.114 | 9.019 |
11 | 25 | Vitaly Petrov Simon Trummer Roberto Gonzalez |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.747 | 9.652 |
12 | 37 | David Cheng Tristan Gommendy Alex Brundle |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'49.778 | 9.683 |
13 | 24 | Jean-Eric Vergne Ben Hanley Matt Rao |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'51.386 | 11.291 |
14 | 97 | Darren Turner Jonathan Adam |
Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE PRO | 1'57.014 | 16.919 |
15 | 95 | Marco Sorensen Nicki Thiim |
Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE PRO | 1'57.419 | 17.324 |
16 | 71 | Sam Bird Davide Rigon |
Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE PRO | 1'57.925 | 17.830 |
17 | 51 | James Calado Alessandro Pier Guidi |
Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE PRO | 1'58.356 | 18.261 |
18 | 67 | Harry Tincknell Andy Priaulx |
Ford GT | LMGTE PRO | 1'58.812 | 18.717 |
19 | 92 | Michael Christensen Kevin Estre |
Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE PRO | 1'58.871 | 18.776 |
20 | 91 | Richard Lietz Frédéric Makowiecki |
Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE PRO | 1'59.148 | 19.053 |
21 | 66 | Stefan Mücke Olivier Pla |
Ford GT | LMGTE PRO | 1'59.192 | 19.097 |
22 | 61 | Matt Griffin Mok Weng Sun Keita Sawa |
Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 1'59.773 | 19.678 |
23 | 54 | Francesco Castellacci Miguel Molina Thomas Flohr |
Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 2'00.205 | 20.110 |
24 | 98 | Pedro Lamy Paul Dalla Lana Mathias Lauda |
Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE AM | 2'00.525 | 20.430 |
25 | 86 | Michael Wainwright Ben Barker Nick Foster |
Porsche 911 RSR (991) | LMGTE AM | 2'00.616 | 20.521 |
26 | 77 | Christian Ried Matteo Cairoli Marvin Dienst |
Porsche 911 RSR (991) | LMGTE AM | 2'00.621 | 20.526 |
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