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Race report
Stuttgart. In the last race before the Le Mans 24-Hours, the
Just like at the season’s opening race in Silverstone,
Despite sunshine at the start, rain was predicted for the closing stages of the race but ultimately it stayed almost dry throughout. The organizers announced 61,000 spectators for the three-day event. After the second of nine rounds in the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC),
How the race went for car number 1:
Lotterer starts from pole in warm sunshine (20C). The #7 Toyota takes the lead under braking around the outside into Bus Stop chicane at the end of lap 10. Two laps later #1 drops to third as the #8 Toyota goes ahead entering La Source. The #2 sister
How the race went for car number 2:
Hartley moves up one place from his fifth place start when second-row starting #9 Toyota locks up at La Source hairpin after the green light. Hartley overtakes the sister #1
Fritz Enzinger, Vice President LMP1: “We started from pole position, set the fastest race lap and scored a podium, but unfortunately we didn’t make it with both cars on the podium. We are still fine with our strategic decision to compete in the first two rounds in low downforce configuration. Now we are looking forward to our last 30-hour test next week. We will head to Le Mans full of confidence and only a few points short in the manufacturer standings.”
Andreas Seidl, Team Principal: “Congratulations to Toyota for the race win and to our team in Weissach and here at the track for a flawless performance. Again both cars finished the race with no technical issues and took points for the championships. Apparently races in Spa are not our greatest skill: Since 2014 we are on pole here every year but we never won. With our cars here in low downforce aero specification, we could not match the speed of the high downforce spec Toyotas because our tyre wear was simply to high. But the third Toyota, with low downforce, we had under control. Comparing the time we lost in the pits due to the puncture, our performance was okay. We will now have our endurance test next week in Aragon and then look forward to Le Mans.”
Drivers
Neel Jani (33, Switzerland): “The pace was more or less what we expected it to be. We could match one Toyota but the other one was out of reach. We were a little unlucky and lost a lot of time twice during Full Course Yellows. After this our only chance to come back in the race was rain.”
André Lotterer (35, Germany): “I had a good start. I was a little surprised when the Toyota came flying by but I was expecting he wouldn’t be able to brake properly for La Source. The first half of that stint was really good but then I had a massive tyre drop and couldn’t keep up the pace. Towards the end of that first stint the situation improved but overall it was not consistent. At my first pit stop we changed the strategy. Because we were expecting rain towards the end of the race, we thought we would not have to double stint all tyres. My last stint was good as well despite some drizzle. The Toyotas have been strong, we have to catch up a bit.”
Nick Tandy (32, Great Britain): “I was the second driver in our car and had a pretty standard stint. We went a little off sequence with the tyre strategy to see if it would help us at the end of the race. But then it didn’t rain significantly.”
Drivers
Earl Bamber (26, New Zealand): “My stint started well. I came out right behind the Toyota and then was battling with number 8 but then unfortunately I picked up a slow puncture. The pace was good afterwards again and I closed the gap to the front a little but to fight back from over 40 seconds is hard.”
Timo Bernhard (36, Germany): “I took over from Earl after the puncture and tried to catch back. It was nice closing the gap. I had a good fight with Neel and managed to get ahead. We took advantage of a Full Course Yellow but Toyota did as well. In the end, Brendon was pushing hard and did a great job but there wasn’t more to get today.”
Brendon Hartley (27, New Zealand): “The Toyotas were quick at the start and I knew I was in for a double stint. With the warmer ambient temperatures, the car's balance was quite different from the previous days. But I had a strong end to the opening stint and overtook André just before the pit-stops. The sister car went onto a different strategy while we managed to keep close to the 8 Toyota. Our car was unlucky when Earl picked up a puncture which put us behind and off strategy. I was in the car for the last couple of hours. The team did a great job and our car was coming on really strong towards the finish. It's another podium, not the step we wanted to stand on, but we take confidence heading to Le Mans.“
All scores: http://www.fiawec.com/courses/classification.html
All results: http://fiawec.alkamelsystems.com
All reports on the previous season can be found in our archive.