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…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at …