After a short on-track session for the ‘fans in buses’ Circuit Safari, the final 60 minutes of Free Practice ahead of tomorrow’s 6 Hours of Fuji saw the two Toyota GR010s bookend the Hypercar grid as Brendon Hartley topped the times with another sub-1:30 mark, a 1:29.865 just under a tenth of a second up on the session topping time from team-mate Kamui Kobayashi in yesterday’s FP2.
The #8 Toyota though was trailed not by the sister car but by the pair of Peugeot 9X8s. Jean-Eric Vergne was second fastest in the session with the #93 Peugeot, well over half a second faster than the car’s previous best of the weekend with the sister #94 a few tenths further back in the hands of Loic Duval.
The #36 Alpine was fourth fastest before the #7 Toyota rounded out the class, 1.6 seconds off Hartley’s best time.
LMP2 saw a second consecutive session topped by Jota, the #38 of Antonio Felix da Costa posting a 1:31.822 which held firm through the session, most
closely challenged by the #10 Vector Sport Oreca of Sebastien Bourdais.
GTE Pro saw a Porsche on top for the first session of the meeting so far.
Gimmi Bruni in the #91 Porsche 911 RSR-19 topped the class with a 1:36.883, 0.226 seconds better than the #51 Ferrari (which has topped both other FP sessions) James Calado providing the Ferrari’s best time of the session.
The second AF Corse Ferrari, #64 Corvette and #92 Porsche completed the order.
The sessions so far have seen one-two performances from Toyota, Jota, AF Corse and Iron Lynx and that was added to in FP3 by Team Project 1.
Ben Barnicoat put the #56 car on top of the times with a 1:38.801, just edging out Matteo Cairoli in the sister #46 car.
The #77 Dempsey Proton Racing Porsche was a later starter to the session after harry Tincknell suffered a left rear suspension problem at the end of the preceding Circuit Safari session.
