Following a frenetic start to the 6 Hours of Barcelona presented by Visit Qatar, Toyota took a further stranglehold as the #8 TR010 Hybrid driven by Brendon Hartley established a small but growing margin over the sister #7 entry in the mid-phase of the race
Replacing Sébastien Buemi during the second round of pit-stops late in the second hour of the race, the New Zealander briefly ceded the lead to the #7 Toyota that Mike Conway had taken over from Nyck de Vries, largely owing to a five-second penalty dished out for a start infraction
But almost immediately, Hartley got by Conway on the pit straight and pulled away to the tune of 14 seconds as both Toyotas, in common with the rest of the Hypercar field, decided to switch to Michelin slicks on a drying track
When Kamui Kobayashi took over from Conway at the third scheduled pit-stop, the gap came down 12 seconds and Toyota prepared to replace Hartley with Fuji hero Ryō Hirakawa
Consolidating a strong third position is the #50 Ferrari AF Corse 499P, which Nicklas Nielsen took over from Miguel Molina; the Dane has maintained a stable gap to the Toyotas ahead while controlling the advance of the #83 AF Corse Ferrari, driven by Yifei Ye, behind
Having indulged in various battles during his stint after taking over the #83 car from Phil Hanson, Ye is just under a minute off the lead but has 15 seconds over the #36 Alpine driven by Victor Martins in fifth
The returning Alex Lynn in the #12 Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA ran sixth, but came under serious pressure from a flying Dries Vanthoor in the #15 BMW M Hybrid V8, which had earlier been given a five-second penalty after Kevin Magnussen collided with the Sébastien Bourdais-driven #38 Cadillac.
Vanthoor moved into sixth position, as BMW bids to halt Toyota taking what increasingly looks like an inevitable 2026 Manufacturers’ crown
With the #38 Cadillac running eighth behind the sister #12 V-Series.R car of Lynn, the final top ten positions are currently occupied by the #009 Aston Martin THOR Team Valkyrie of Marco Sørensen and the #35 Alpine A424 piloted by Charles Milesi
The #51 Ferrari suffered several time-consuming issues in the third hour, the first of which was a delayed re-start after a sluggish getaway from a brief Full Course Yellow period; that cost James Calado several places, and the Briton then dropped away further after complaining of a severe imbalance in his 499P, triggering a switch to a new set of tyres
The race was neutralised after 3hrs35mins when several cars came unstuck on the entry to Turn Seven, after fluid appeared to make the track treacherous – contributing to the #93 Peugeot (Nick Cassidy), the #61 Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG (Rui Andrade) and the #27 Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin Vantage (Zacharie Robichon) going off
That brought out the third Safety Car of the race, as Robichon was recovered from the gravel and the vast majority of the field pitted for what was essentially a free stop
But it also triggered issues for the delayed #007 Aston Martin Valkyrie driven by Harry Tincknell, who stopped with a technical problem during the full Safety Car period
LMGT3
The #92 The Bend Manthey Porsche 911 GT3 R enjoys a 20-second lead in LMGT3, after Riccardo Pera continued the strong race started by Yasser Shahin over the opening two hours
The Italian was able to cover off Peter Dempsey in the Racing Team Turkey by TF Corvette as the third Safety Car period began just before the fifth hour arrived
Sebastian Priaulx had been running third in the #77 Proton Competition Ford Mustang just prior to his third pit-stop, which promoted the Parker Thompson-driven #69 Team WRT BMW M4 to the position, albeit 40 seconds away from the lead; the Canadian subsequently handed over the wheel to Dan Harper for the final two hours, with the Northern Irishman currently running second
Third is the pole-sitting #10 Garage 59 McLaren, as Marvin Kirchhöfer aims to build upon some sensational lapping by Tom Fleming, who claimed the additional point for setting the pace in Hyperpole 24 hours ago
Jonny Edgar, who is primed to become a solo LMGT3 Drivers’ title-winner, ran fourth but was handed a 10-second time penalty for Turn One contact with the Martin Berry-driven Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG
That dropped the #33 TF Sport Corvette down the order to ninth as the fifth hour arrived
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