Toyota celebrated both success in the FIA World Endurance Drivers’ Championship and winning the 6 Hours of Bahrain race today.
The #8 Toyota Racing crew of Anthony Davidson and Sebastien Buemi clinched the FIA World Endurance Championship for Drivers while the sister crew of Alex Wurz, Stephane Sarrazin and Mike Conway claimed their first race win of the 2014 season after a flawless performance in the day/night spectacular in the desert.
Despite not scoring points today after losing thirty minutes in the pits with an alternator problem, Davidson and Buemi took the FIA World Endurance Championship for Drivers ahead of the final race at Interlagos later this month.
Filling out the podium at Bahrain were both Porsche 919 Hybrid entries with the #14 car of Marc Lieb, Neel Jani and Romain Dumas just heading home the #20 entry of Mark Webber, Brendon Hartley and Timo Bernhard - the team's best result of the season so far.
The #13 Rebellion car of Dominik Kraihamer, Fabio Leimer and Andrea Belicchi won the LMP1-L class after a late race pit stop for race long leaders Nick Heidfeld/Nicolas Prost/Mathias Beche in the #12 Rebellion entry.
The LMP2 class saw the usual thrilling race long battle, this time between the #47 KCMG Oreca-Nissan and the title chasing #27 SMP Racing entry. Matt Howson/Richard Bradley and Alexander Imperatori eventually won out, taking their second victory of the season (after COTA), with a well-judged manoeuvre by Bradley in the fourth hour, sealing the win.
Late race drama saw Nicolas Minassian serve a stop/go penalty for contact with the #1 Audi R18 e-tron quattro and then technical difficulties with just 15-mins to go. The sister #37 SMP Oreca-Nissan inherited second place in the final moments.
As a result of the #27 SMP cars difficulties Zlobin’s points lead in the LMP2 Drivers’ championship has been overturned by the G-Drive Ligier-Nissan of Olivier Pla/Roman Rusinov and Julien Canal, who score third placed points despite having lost over ten minutes after two lengthy pit stops for repairs to their rear suspension.
The LMGTE Pro class again saw tremendous action throughout the 6 Hours with the #51 AF Corse pairing of Gianmaria Bruni and Toni Vilander taking their fourth class win of the season to ensure they secured the LMGTE Drivers’ title in the best possible manner. The win also settled the Teams’ crown in the #51 AF Corse squads favour.
The #51 AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia defeated the #97 Aston Martin Racing duo of Darren Turner and Stefan Mucke after they had to make an extra fuelling stop.
Aston Martin Racing celebrated a double Championship success as David Heinemeier-Hansson and Kristian Poulsen scored their fourth class victory to seal both the Drivers’ and Team’s championships.
Taking second place in the LMGTE Am class was the #81 AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia of Michele Rugolo, Stephen Wyatt and Andrea Bertolini.
A full report will follow soon, and results can be found HERE
