Having dominated qualifying, the high-downforce Toyotas retained a clear edge in pace over the Le Mans-spec Porsches in full dry conditions, but rain showers and two caution periods helped keep the German manufacturer in contention until the end.

A safety car caused by a crash at Copse for Jose Maria Lopez in the #7 Toyota allowed the #2 919 Hybrid of Brendon Hartley, Earl Bamber and Timo Bernhard to stay close enough to the #8 car to attempt a strategic gamble during its final stop.

Hartley's car took fuel only, while Toyota took four new tyres as Nakajima handed over to Buemi for the last stint, giving the Kiwi driver an eight-second advantage with 31 minutes remaining.

But Buemi was able to carve into the Porsche's cushion at a rate of over a second a lap, before making the inevitable pass for the lead at The Loop with 12 minutes left.

Buemi went on to seal the win - his and Davidson's first in the WEC since Shanghai 2014, and the #8 crew's first as a trio - by 6.173s.

Behind the lead pair, the #1 Porsche of Neel Jani, Andre Lotterer and Nick Tandy finished third a further 40 seconds back, losing time with a pair of additional pitstops to switch first to intermediates during a shower in the third hour and then back to slicks when the rain abated.

Prior to Lopez's crash, which resulted in the Argentinian being taken to hospital for precautionary checks, the #7 Toyota was already well out of contention.

Polesitter Mike Conway traded the lead with Buemi's #8 car in the early stages, before dropping off the pace after the first round of pitstops with a rear anti-roll bar problem.

A change of rear bodywork was followed by a trip to the gravel at Vale for Kobayashi in the third hour, prior to the Lopez accident that consigned the #7 car into the garage for lengthy repairs.

Conway eventually took the finish some 38 laps down.

The ByKolles ENSO CLM P1/01, which spent time in the garage early on with a brake issue, failed to make the finish after making contact with the #97 Aston Martin Vantage on the pitlane entry.

In LMP2, it was the JOTA Sport-run #38 Jackie Chan DC Racing Oreca of Oliver Jarvis, Thomas Laurent and Ho-Pin Tung that took a comfortable win.

The defending champion Signatech Alpine team controlled the class battle for the first two-thirds of the race, before two late Full Course Yellows shook up the order.

Matthieu Vaxiviere briefly led for the TDS Racing squad when racing resumed at the start of the fifth hour, but Jarvis was able to make a decisive pass on the #28 Oreca when it was in Emmanuel Collard's hands in the final hour.

After a final stop with 20 minutes left, Jarvis went on to win by 19.376s over the best of the Rebellions, the #13 Oreca of Nicolas Prost, Bruno Senna and Julien Canal.

TDS fell just 1.8s second short of the runner-up spot, with Vaxiviere making a late charge after taking over again for the finish, with the Signatech car of Nicolas Lapierre, Gustavo Menezes and Matt Rao ending up a lapped fourth.

Ford beats Ferrari in GTE Pro

Ford survived a late scare with an opening door to take victory in GTE Pro, as Harry Tincknell and Andy Priaulx took a home win in the #67 Ganassi-run GT along with Pipo Derani.

The trio had led early on but fell out of sequence after having to make an early first stop to address the door problem, which recurred in the last half-hour.

But the two Full Course Yellows gave the #67 trio a free stop, putting them back in line with their rivals, with Tincknell bringing the car home with a 15s advantage over the #51 AF Corse Ferrari of James Calado and Alessandro Pier Guidi.

Third in class went to the sole surviving Porsche, the #91 of Frederic Makowiecki and Richard Lietz, a further 10 seconds back, narrowly ahead of the second of the Fords, the #66 of Oliver Pla, Stefan Mucke and Billy Johnson – which didn’t stop during the FCY periods.

The other mid-engined 911 RSR of Michael Christensen and Kevin Estre caused the first caution period when the car came to a halt and set on fire in the fourth hour.

In GTE Am, Matt Griffin scored a famous victory for the #61 Clearwater Racing Ferrari squad along with teammates Keita Sawa and Mok Weng Sun.

Griffin took advantage of a last-lap clash between Pedro Lamy in the #98 Aston Martin, which had led the class for almost the entire race, and Miguel Molina in the #54 Spirit of Race Ferrari at Stowe.

Lamy recovered from the incident to finish second, 1.7s behind Griffin, while Molina was unable to continue, handing the final class podium place to the #77 Proton Competition Porsche.

Pos.	#	Drivers	Car	Class	Laps	Time
1	8	Anthony Davidson   Kazuki Nakajima   Sébastien Buemi	Toyota TS050 Hybrid	LMP1	197
2	2	Timo Bernhard   Brendon Hartley   Earl Bamber	Porsche 919 Hybrid	LMP1	197	6.173
3	1	Andre Lotterer   Neel Jani   Nick Tandy	Porsche 919 Hybrid	LMP1	197	46.956
4	38	Oliver Jarvis   Ho-Pin Tung   Thomas Laurent	Oreca 07	LMP2	184	13 laps
5	31	Bruno Senna   Julien Canal   Nicolas Prost	Oreca 07	LMP2	184	19.376
6	28	François Perrodo   Emmanuel Collard   Matthieu Vaxivière	Oreca 07	LMP2	184	21.268
7	36	Nicolas Lapierre   Gustavo Menezes   Matt Rao	Alpine A470	LMP2	183	14 laps
8	26	Roman Rusinov   Pierre Thiriet   Alex Lynn	Oreca 07	LMP2	183	32.247
9	24	Jean-Eric Vergne   Jonathan Hirschi   Tor Graves	Oreca 07	LMP2	183	1'08.075
10	25	Vitaly Petrov   Simon Trummer   Roberto Gonzalez	Oreca 07	LMP2	182	15 laps
11	37	David Cheng   Tristan Gommendy   Alex Brundle	Oreca 07	LMP2	182	11.790
12	13	Nelson Piquet Jr.   David Heinemeier Hansson   Mathias Beche	Oreca 07	LMP2	172	25 laps
13	67	Pipo Derani   Harry Tincknell   Andy Priaulx	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	171	26 laps
14	51	James Calado   Alessandro Pier Guidi	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE PRO	171	15.604
15	91	Richard Lietz   Frédéric Makowiecki	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	171	26.585
16	66	Stefan Mücke   Olivier Pla   Billy Johnson	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	171	27.491
17	71	Sam Bird   Davide Rigon	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE PRO	170	27 laps
18	95	Marco Sorensen   Nicki Thiim   Richie Stanaway	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE PRO	170	43.753
19	97	Darren Turner   Jonathan Adam   Daniel Serra	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE PRO	168	29 laps
20	61	Matt Griffin   Mok Weng Sun   Keita Sawa	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	166	31 laps
21	98	Pedro Lamy   Paul Dalla Lana   Mathias Lauda	Aston Martin Vantage V8	LMGTE AM	166	1.768
22	77	Christian Ried   Matteo Cairoli   Marvin Dienst	Porsche 911 RSR (991)	LMGTE AM	166	25.315
23	7	Kamui Kobayashi   Mike Conway   Jose Maria Lopez	Toyota TS050 Hybrid	LMP1	159	38 laps
24	86	Michael Wainwright   Ben Barker   Nick Foster	Porsche 911 RSR (991)	LMGTE AM	143	54 laps
25	54	Francesco Castellacci   Miguel Molina   Thomas Flohr	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	165	32 laps
26	4	Oliver Webb   Dominik Kraihamer   James Rossiter	ENSO CLM P1/01	LMP1	155	42 laps
27	92	Michael Christensen   Kevin Estre	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	95	102 laps