FIA WEC: Spa Francorchamps, Race Analysis

Lots to Look at in Anticipation of Le Mans

As the dust settles after Spa, and the arguments begin about who has the advantage, Paul Truswell analyses the data from the second round of the 2013 World Endurance Championship and concludes that it will be a close race at Le Mans next month.

Toyota Motorsport Technical Director Pascal Vasselon presented a very downbeat visage to journalists after Saturday’s Spa Six Hours. He couldn’t see any positive elements to draw from the weekend, he said. Neither of the Toyota TS030 chassis was particularly well-suited to the demands of the classic Ardennes track: one being last year’s ‘compromise’ car; the other being the first prototype of the chassis that Toyota will take to Le Mans for the 24 hour race in June.

With the new car retiring to the garage with a little over half the race elapsed, it was left to the older one to trail home a lap behind in fourth place. My view is that Vasselon may have learned some tricks from his inscrutable Japanese colleagues though. Although on the surface, the data from the second round of the 2013 WEC suggests that Audi has the advantage, if one looks a little more deeply, it may well be that Audi might not have things as much their own way at Le Mans as they have had so far this season.

So let’s look at the evidence. First of all, top speed. The following table shows the average of the best 20 top speeds recorded by the timekeepers at the end of the Kemmel Straight, for each of the LMP1 entrants. Since the no. 7 Toyota retired after 99 laps, and in order to make the comparison more fair, I have shown two figures, the first being the result of just looking at the first 99 laps, and the second at the whole race.

[sws_divider_small_padding]This would seem to indicate that there is nothing to choose between the two ‘Le Mans configuration’ cars, and that the difference between the Rebellion Lolas and the manufacturers is less than the difference between the two configurations of Audi.

I am not a fan of fastest lap times, but since the qualifying format has changed, it is easy to overlook them. For that reason alone, it is interesting to consider them here:

[sws_divider_small_padding]Not much joy for Toyota here: it looks like they could do with making a faster car, doesn’t it? But beware of reading too much into best lap times…

Looking at average lap times is always more relevant. Again, in order to enable comparison between the Audis and the no.7 Toyota, one set of averages looks just at the first 99 laps (average of the best 20 laps within the first 99), and the other looks at the average of the best 40 laps of the race.

[sws_divider_small_padding]This would seem to show that the no. 1 Audi was at a clear advantage over the no. 2. Just as well, as it spent around three-quarters of a minute longer in the pits, due partly to the puncture which brought Lotterer in prematurely, and initially it seemed that the time lost would be difficult to recover.

The analysis of the stints provides a useful insight into the relative performances of the drivers.

[sws_divider_small_padding]Again, there doesn’t seem much positive news for Toyota here. But notice that the no. 8 car managed to complete the race on one fewer pit stop than any of the Audis. The no. 7 car was on a similar strategy, and would have managed to achieve the same thing, had it not retired. In that case, it is worthwhile speculating what would have happened, had the car kept going at the same pace.

On the assumption (a) that Nakajima and Wurz would have been able to return the same kind of lap times that Lapierre was doing, and (b) that the pit stops would have continued at 22-lap intervals, then my projection is that the car would have completed 168 laps (the same number as the three Audis did) in 6h 02m 37s. This would have put it in third place, 1m 41s behind the winner, but crucially, 13s ahead of the no. 3 Audi.

The reason that this is significant, of course, is that it was the long-tail version that was the principal opposition to Toyota at Spa, in the sense that the two cars were in comparable configurations. If the Toyota (which was using its Le Mans aero), can beat Audi in the same mode, then it bodes well for Le Mans. Pascal Vasselon knows that as well as anyone.

Of course, there is still the reliability issue that Toyota has to address. But the information that I managed to glean at the end of the race was that the problem was not with the hybrid motor itself, but was with the way that it had been installed (finger trouble, if you like). It was this that led to the failure, which in turn led the brakes to overheat. It would have taken too long to replace the damaged braking system and continue the race, but the fault with the hybrid was fixed as soon as the car was pushed back into the garage.

Sure, I was disappointed that Toyota didn’t show more strongly at Spa. But don’t forget that the car is only just a year into its development – and it has led every race that it has participated in. Of its eight races, it has won three of them, on each occasion when its singleton car was outnumbered by Audis. The team is strong. A win at Le Mans would be against the odds, but is not out of the question.

Paul Truswell