Toyota GAZOO Racing’s Sebastien Buemi took the lead away from Porsche Penske Motorsport’s Matt Campbell with 36 minutes to go Saturday (Nov. 2). From there, Buemi pulled away to win the FIA World Endurance Championship 8 Hours of Bahrain Powered by Bapco Energies with teammates Brendon Hartley and Ryo Hirakawa.
“Perhaps, it was my best [drive],” Buemi said after the race. “I knew that I had to take risks. The last overtake on the [No. 5 Porsche], I thought it was not too bad. Still, [the team] asked us to let [Campbell] by again and I didn’t want to lose time passing him back again. In the end, it’s a team sport and today, we did a good job.”
By virtue of the No. 8 Toyota’s victory, Toyota also won the manufacturers’ championship over Porsche. The final margin was six points.
Buemi, Hartley and Hirakawa’s margin of victory was 27.539 seconds over Ferrari AF Corse’s James Calado, Antonio Giovinazzi and Alessandro Pier Guidi. Campbell, Michael Christensen and Frederic Makowiecki had to settle for third after Giovinazzi passed Campbell on the final lap.
Peugeot TotalEnergies’ Mikkel Jensen, Nico Mueller and Jean-Eric Vergne were fourth. Signatech Alpine’s Paul-Loup Chatin, Jules Gounon and Ferdinand Habsburg were fifth.
Porsche Penske Motorsport’s Kevin Estre, Andre Lotterer and Laurens Vanthoor finished a season-worst 11th and failed to score points. However, contact in the final hour between Ferrari AF Corse’s Antonio Fuoco and Signatech Alpine’s Charles Milesi resulted in Fuoco cutting his left rear tire. That won the championship for the Porsche trio. The final margin was 35 points.
Buemi started from the overall pole in his Toyota with Giovinazzi giving chase. That lead was short-lived as contact from TF Sport’s Hiroshi Koizumi sent Buemi spinning in turn 1 and Giovinazzi into the lead.
Buemi continued without damage to his Toyota. Koizumi was given a penalty for causing the spin.
Giovinazzi led until the first round of stops, then lost the advantage to Hertz Team JOTA’s Callum Ilott. Calado put the Ferrari back up front once he got in the car and kept himself up there to halfway.
Other than Buemi’s spin in the first 20 minutes, the first half was very clean. It was the sixth hour of the race before the first interruption occurred when Proton Competition’s Giammarco Levorato suffered an apparent engine failure and pulled off with fire coming out of his Mustang.
Toyota GAZOO Racing’s No. 7 was the main competitor to the No. 51 Ferrari for the lead, but an unusual electrical issue took them out of the hunt. The car would intermittently get stuck in second gear, then fix itself. The issue was unable to be fixed and ultimately ended their day.
The No. 8 Toyota was not really in contention until the No. 94 Peugeot of Paul di Resta had a mechanical failure that brought out the safety car with just under two hours to go. That changed up the pit strategy as Hirakawa pitted and got out of the car in favor of Buemi right before the interruption, before everyone else had to stop.
Once the final round of stops began in the final hour, Buemi was able to rise up the order as others stopped. When the final stops were complete with 42 minutes to go, it was a battle for the win between Campbell and Buemi. Buemi was able to get past, but went off the road to do it. To avoid a penalty, he had to give it back.
A lap later, Buemi was able to retake the overall lead cleanly. Once out front, he drove away and took the win easily.
In LMGT3, United Autosports’ Josh Caygill started on pole in his McLaren and led early on. A slower first stop put TF Sport’s Tom van Rompuy out front in his Corvette.
The No. 81 Corvette dominated the race until the final two hours. Safety car periods allowed much of the rest of the pack to catch up.
That resulted in an all-out duel at the front with 90 minutes to go. The Heart of Racing’s Alex Riberas had the lead, but Iron Dames’ Rahel Frey wanted it. With 83 minutes to go, Frey made the move for the lead in turn 1.
She had it for a moment, but went wide. That allowed Riberas to sweep back past. The move resulted in a loss of momentum for both drivers. That allowed Vista AF Corse’s Alessio Rovera and Davide Rigon to move up into first and second. A penalty for procedure issues under the full course yellow forced Frey to pit and took the Iron Dames out of the hunt.
The racing among the leaders brought both of the TF Sport Corvettes into the hunt. Daniel Juncadella was able to work himself into contention. He was able to get past Rigon for second. Teammate Charlie Eastwood was able to follow past.
However, once Rovera got the lead, he was able to pull out to a decent advantage. From there, he was able to keep pace and hold on for the class win with Francois Heriau and Simon Mann.
Vista AF Corse’s margin of victory was 3.022 seconds over Eastwood, van Rompuy and Rui Andrade. Juncadella, Koizumi and Sebastien Baud were third, followed by Iron Lynx’s Matteo Cairoli, Matteo Cressoni and Claudio Schiavoni. The Porsche of Manthey EMA’s Richard Lietz, Morris Schuring and Yasser Shahin were fifth.
The LMGT3 championship was already clinched by Manthey PureRxcing’s Klaus Bachler, Alex Malykhin and Joel Sturm in Fuji last month. The trio finished ninth in class.
FIA World Endurance Championship 8 Hours of Bahrain Powered by Bapco Energies Unofficial Results
About the author
Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the site's FREE e-mail newsletter that publishes Monday-Friday and occasionally on weekends. He keeps TV broadcasters honest with weekly editions of Couch Potato Tuesday and serves as the site's Sports Car racing editor.
Outside of Frontstretch, Phil is the press officer for Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, N.Y. He covers all the action on the high-banked dirt track from regular DIRTcar Modified racing to occasional visits from touring series such as the Super DIRTcar Series.
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