Fuji WEC: Toyota extends advantage amid more delays
Toyota extended its advantage over its privateer LMP1 opposition in the second practice session for the WEC 6 Hours of Fuji, which was again marred by two stoppages.

As in first practice, Friday afternoon's running was red-flagged for kerb damage at Turn 15, with around 50 minutes of track time lost in two separate stoppages. The session was extended, but only by 10 minutes.
It was the #8 car that was the quicker of the two Toyotas again, as Fernando Alonso immediately beat Sebastien Buemi's FP1 benchmark with a 1m23.973s.
That was enough to beat Jose Maria Lopez in the sister #7 machine by over a second, with both the Argentine and Alonso posting their respective cars' best times in the first six minutes of the session before the first red flag.
Rebellion Racing was the quickest of the non-hybrid squads, with the Silverstone race-winning #3 R-13-Gibson leading the charge in the hands of Thomas Laurent with a time 1.724s off the pace of Alonso.
Jenson Button was fourth-fastest in the #11 SMP Racing BR Engineering BR1-AER, just a tenth behind, followed by the #1 Rebellion of Andre Lotterer and the second of the SMP BR1s, the #17 of Matevos Isaakyan which slowly limped back to the pits in the dying stages of the session.
ByKolles returnee Tom Dillmann and DragonSpeed's Ben Hanley completed the LMP1 order.
LMP2 was topped by Signatech Alpine, with Andre Negrao setting the best time in class of 1m30.893s in the #36 Oreca.
That was enough to beat the better of the Jota Sport-run Jackie Chan DC Orecas, the #38 of Ho-Pin Tung, by four tenths, while teammate Weiron Tan was third fastest in the #37 car.
Aston Martin topped the GTE Pro times courtesy of a late flyer from Nicki Thiim in the #95 Vantage GTE.
Thiim set a 1m37.659s with less than 10 minutes remaining to depose Ford driver Harry Tincknell by a little under two tenths.
Ferrari made it three different makes in the top three in class, Davide Rigon leading its charge in the #71 488 GTE Evo, ahead of the two Porsche 911 RSRs.
BMW continued to struggle, its two MTEK-run M8 GTEs ending up eighth and 10th in class.
Porsche again topped the times in GTE Am, with Matteo Cairoli posting the class benchmark of 1m38.989s in the #88 Dempsey-Proton 911 RSR.
Second practice results:
Pos. | # | Drivers | Car | Class | Time | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 8 | Toyota TS050 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'23.973 | ||
2 | 7 | Toyota TS050 Hybrid | LMP1 | 1'25.068 | 1.095 | |
3 | 3 | Rebellion R13 | LMP1 | 1'25.697 | 1.724 | |
4 | 11 | BR Engineering BR1 | LMP1 | 1'25.801 | 1.828 | |
5 | 1 | Rebellion R13 | LMP1 | 1'25.931 | 1.958 | |
6 | 17 | BR Engineering BR1 | LMP1 | 1'27.664 | 3.691 | |
7 | 4 | ENSO CLM P1/01 | LMP1 | 1'28.209 | 4.236 | |
8 | 10 | BR Engineering BR1 | LMP1 | 1'28.914 | 4.941 | |
9 | 36 | Alpine A470 | LMP2 | 1'30.410 | 6.437 | |
10 | 38 | Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'30.842 | 6.869 | |
11 | 37 | Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'30.990 | 7.017 | |
12 | 28 | Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'31.040 | 7.067 | |
13 | 29 | Dallara P217 | LMP2 | 1'31.259 | 7.286 | |
14 | 31 | Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'31.995 | 8.022 | |
15 | 50 | Ligier JSP 217 | LMP2 | 1'32.736 | 8.763 | |
16 | 95 | Aston Martin Vantage AMR | LMGTE PRO | 1'37.659 | 13.686 | |
17 | 67 | Ford GT | LMGTE PRO | 1'37.821 | 13.848 | |
18 | 71 | Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE PRO | 1'38.041 | 14.068 | |
19 | 91 | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE PRO | 1'38.053 | 14.080 | |
20 | 92 | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE PRO | 1'38.081 | 14.108 | |
21 | 66 | Ford GT | LMGTE PRO | 1'38.179 | 14.206 | |
22 | 51 | Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE PRO | 1'38.248 | 14.275 | |
23 | 81 | BMW M8 GTE | LMGTE PRO | 1'38.388 | 14.415 | |
24 | 97 | Aston Martin Vantage AMR | LMGTE PRO | 1'38.477 | 14.504 | |
25 | 82 | BMW M8 GTE | LMGTE PRO | 1'38.504 | 14.531 | |
26 | 88 | Satoshi Hoshino | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE AM | 1'38.989 | 15.016 |
27 | 77 | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE AM | 1'39.152 | 15.179 | |
28 | 61 | Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 1'39.295 | 15.322 | |
29 | 54 | Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 1'39.410 | 15.437 | |
30 | 70 | Ferrari 488 GTE | LMGTE AM | 1'39.559 | 15.586 | |
31 | 56 | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE AM | 1'39.712 | 15.739 | |
32 | 86 | Porsche 911 RSR | LMGTE AM | 1'39.930 | 15.957 | |
33 | 90 | Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE AM | 1'40.181 | 16.208 | |
34 | 98 | Aston Martin Vantage | LMGTE AM | 1'40.429 | 16.456 |

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About this article
Series | WEC |
Event | Fuji |
Author | Jamie Klein |
Fuji WEC: Toyota extends advantage amid more delays
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