Le Mans: Redemption for Buemi and Toyota
PROZEDUR At last Toyota won the 24 Hours of Le Mans and with them Sébastien Buemi with Fernando Alonso and Kazuki Nakajima. Rebellion brought both cars to the finish behind the two uncompetitive Toyota. Mathias Beche thus finished third, as did Jonathan Hirschi in LMP2. It was clear early on that Toyota had established itself as the sole favorite at [...]
It was clear early on that Toyota, as the sole favorite, could only beat itself at the 86th edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans. After many dramas in the past, both TS050 Hybrids ran flawlessly. Technically, the private competition didn't stand a chance.
Which of the two will win?
Nor did any mistakes creep into the team's pit work or the six drivers on the track. The only question in what was for long stretches the most boring race in the last few years was which of the two Toyota trios would come out on top.
The answer was unclear for a long time. 23 times, #7 with Sébastien Buemi, Fernando Alonso and Kazuki Nakajima, who started from pole position, alternated with their teammates in #8, Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and José Maria Lopez in the lead.
From one lap, the lead over the private LMP1 cars without hybridization grew to twelve by the time they crossed the finish line. From 9:43 a.m. on Sunday morning until the finish at 3 p.m., the car of the two former GP drivers Buemi and Nakajima was in front with the idolized Formula 1 star Alonso.
Buemi praises Alonso
The two-time world champion did very well. While Buemi set the fastest time on the 13.626-kilometer asphalt of the Circuit des 24 Heures, which consists of a race track and an overland road, as early as on lap five, the Spaniard also stood out in unfamiliar traffic on his debut at Le Mans with skilful and speedy behavior.
Alonso has never had to overtake as many cars as in this race, in which 60 teams started, in his entire Formula 1 career (soon to be 300 Grands Prix) - although this time always with overspeed from 1000 hp system power.
For Sébastien Buemi, this was one of the reasons for his own long-awaited triumph.
Sébastien Buemi: "I expected a bigger difference in the pace of the two cars. Normally, a car within a team is always a bit faster. We were only towards the end. Fernando's stints during the night were really impressive, Kazuki was able to follow Kamui on older tires, and when I went out on new tires I was able to put 30 seconds out. Then we had some luck with the safety car, while at one point they lost almost two more minutes because of a fuel problem."
Happy and relieved
After all the bad luck of the past few years at Le Mans, where he missed out on the longed-for victory with what was in many cases the fastest car in the field, he now appreciates this good fortune.
Especially in the last few minutes, which turned into drama two years ago, his mind went crazy waiting for Nakajima to cross the finish line.
Sébastien Buemi: "Yes, the last few minutes were bad. But it's over now. It was tough to miss out on victory here several times. So I'm relieved, happy and proud. And now I want to enjoy this success as intensively as possible."
The third Swiss overall winner at Le Mans
Sébastien Buemi is the third Swiss Le Mans overall winner after Marcel Fässler (2011, 2012 and 2014 with Audi) and Neel Jani (2016 with Porsche). All three were also world champions once each (Fässler in 2012, Buemi in 2014 and Jani in 2016).
In the 2018/19 super season, which will not end for another year at Le Mans, Buemi is also the clear WRC leader together with Alonso and Nakajim after the success at Spa in May.
Rebellion in the seats of honor
Of the five LMP1 privateer teams, Rebellion was soon the fastest. Although technical problems increased over the distance, the team managed to get both Rebellion R13s built by Oreca with Gibson naturally aspirated V8 engines over the distance. Luck: All the other private LMP1s experienced even more difficulties.
The number #1 of Neel Jani, André Lotterer and Bruno Senna was the slightly faster car, but was tied back early by losing the front hood in the first corner (!) with a subsequent pit stop.
The chase brought the trio up to third place past their teammates Mathias Beche, Thomas Laurent and Gustavo Menezes, only to be thrown back behind them again with incidents.
After 24 hours, Beche was the second Swiss on the overall winners' podium, which Jani missed by one place.
In seventh place overall, Jonathan Hirschi from Neuchâtel was one of three drivers to make it onto the podium in the LMP2 class, also in third place, driving an Oreca-Gibson from Graff Racing.
