The #7 Toyota Gazoo Racing GR010 HYBRID topped the first practice session of the 8 Hours of Bahrain weekend this afternoon, with a 1:49.856 from Kamui Kobayashi. The time was set after a lengthy red flag stoppage and before heavy rain towards the end of the running.
The red flag period was caused by a sandstorm trackside, light rain and banners being blown onto the track at Turn 1. It lasted 45 minutes and came after the front-running Hypercars had completed a handful of laps. This led to race control extending the session by 45 minutes, to 14:30 local time.
When the track went green again, the entire field headed straight back out to make the most of the extended session, but that was interrupted again by heavy rain with around 30 minutes remaining. Initially, when the rain arrived, only a handful of cars braved the conditions, with both Toyotas, the #51 Ferrari and #5 Penske Porsche among the first cars to head back out on wets.
The #21 AF Corse Ferrari meanwhile, stopped out on track with WEC newcomer Franck Dezoteux at the wheel shortly after the rain started coming down.
Up front, with no improvements in the closing minutes due to the weather, the #8 Toyota ended up second, with a 1:49.960 set by Sebastien Buemi.
The #99 Proton Competition Porsche 963 came closest to the Toyotas after Gianmaria Bruni completed a 1:50.290 tour of the circuit shortly after the red flag.
The #6 and #5 Penske Porsches completed the top five with laps flying laps and five-tenths off the #7 respectively.
Ferrari AF Corse’s 499Ps on the other hand, ended up eighth and ninth, slower than the #38 JOTA and #2 Cadillac that finished up sixth and seventh.
In LMP2 it was United Autosports’ #22 ORECA that ran fastest after Filipe Albuquerque reeled off a 1:54.100, his time was half a second quicker than the rest of the field. The #10 Vector ORECA ended up second, with the #31 WRT ORECA third.
D’Station Racing’s #777 Aston Martin Vantage AMR GTE set the pace in GTE Am, after Tomonobu Fujii managed a 1:59.516. The #57 Kessel Ferrari slotted in second, while the GR Racing Porsche took third making it three manufacturers in the top three.
Free Practice 2 is set to get underway at 17:30 local time.
