The 2017 6 Hours of Spa saw Toyota Gazoo Racing and Ferrari secure one-two finishes in LM P1 and LM GTE respectively. Outright honours went to the N°8 Toyota TS050-Hybrid (Buemi/Davidson/Nakajima) which crossed the finish line a handful of seconds clear of the N°7 car (Conway/Kobayashi). The Japanese team had a third prototype in Belgium for Sarrazin/Kunimoto/Lapierre who ended up fifth after running a low-downforce aero package. Third past the flag at Spa-Francorchamps was the N°2 Porsche 919 Hybrid of Bernhard/Bamber/Hartley.
Friday’s qualifying was topped by the N°1 Porsche 919 Hybrid (Jani/Lotterer/Tandy) which got away to a clean start but was unable to prevent the N°8 and N°7 Toyota TS050-Hybrids from easing ahead in the course of the opening hour. With two hours remaining, Porsche took advantage of a Full Course Yellow period (FCY) to recover top spot after a nicely-timed refuelling stop for Brendon Hartley. The German failed to benefit from this move, however, when a collision between the New Zealander and an LM P2 runner forced him to pit for a splitter replacement.
Toyota Gazoo Racing and Porsche LMP Team used mainly Michelin’s hard-compound tyre for the race which took place in reasonably good weather. The track temperature for the start even exceeded 30°C, although the conditions were cloudier and there were even a few drops of rain when the action concluded six hours later.
In LM GTE, Ferrari dominated both qualifying and the race with AF Corse’s N°71 488 GTE (Rigon/Bird) which came out on top after a virile duel with the N°51 sister car of Calado/Pier Guidi (N°51). Helped by a flawless strategy, the Italian machines succeeded in pulling gradually clear of Ford Chip Ganassi Team UK’s Ford GTs.
In accordance with this year’s regulations, which allow a maximum of four sets of tyres per car for six-hour races, the LM P1 and LM GTE Pro teams all double stinted, although Porsche LMP Team, Toyota Gazoo Racing, Ford Chip Ganassi Team UK and Ferrari ran offset strategies.
“Our Michelin tyres performed well all weekend,” reported Davide Rigon, winner in LM GTE Pro along with team-mate Sam Bird. “We took advantage of their grip to post a quick time in qualifying. In the race, we wondered whether their high performance meant we would have trouble double-stinting, especially as the track was hotter today than it was during practice. Those doubts quickly lifted when we succeeded in double-stinting our front tyres twice before double-stinting a complete set towards the end of the race.”
“Spa is harder on tyres than Silverstone where the season kicked off three weeks ago,” noted Jérôme Mondain, manager of Michelin’s endurance racing programmes. “We were expecting to see more wear than we did in England but that wasn’t the case and the lap times showed that our latest tyres are both consistent and resistant to wear. The N°2 Porsche 919 Hybrid even completed more than two stints on the same rubber before the finish. Today’s weather might have come as a surprise to some but, as we saw last year, it’s not always cold for the 6 Hours of Spa!”
The next date in the 2017 FIA WEC calendar is the official test day at Le Mans on June 4 when teams will gather to prepare for this year’s Le Mans 24 Hours which follows a fortnight later on June 17-18.
