WEC: Private drivers save Swiss honor
Things are getting tight for Neel Jani: In Fuji, the Porsche works driver lost further points from his lead in the drivers' championship. Toyota celebrated a redemptive home victory. The Rebellion team and GT driver Joël Camathias finished on the podium in their classes. It wasn't Sébastien Buemi's car that provided the [...]
It was not Sébastien Buemi's car that provided the redemptive result for Toyota four months after the huge disappointment at Le Mans, but the trio of Kamui Kobayashi, Stéphane Sarrazin and Mike Conway. For the Japanese, this is a similarly big and emotional success as after his only F1 podium with Sauber at the 2012 Japanese GP. The second Toyota team with Sébastien Buemi couldn't quite keep up the pace of the front runners and finished fourth.
The finish was more like a sprint after six laps than an endurance race after six hours. With a gap of just 1.4 seconds, Audi with Loïc Duval, Lucas di Grassi and Oliver Jarvis finished second and 17.3 seconds behind was the Porsche of reigning World Champions Mark Webber, Timo Bernhard and Brendon Hartley, who crossed the finish line in third place. With severe balance problems with their Porsche 919 Hybrid, Neel Jani, Marc Lieb and Romain Dumas could not go beyond fifth place.
Only Neel Jani still has a real chance of winning the World Championship title
Since the triumph at Le Mans, with which they massively extended their WRC lead, Neel Jani and his colleagues have not scored a podium finish. In Japan, their lead in the championship table shrank from 37.5 to 23 points. The winning Toyota trio is now the new runner-up. At the remaining two races in November, 52 points will still be awarded. Neel Jani: "We've got to get to the bottom of our problems and then make a step forward if we want to stay in front in the WRC." Marcel Fässler's Audi R18 had to be withdrawn after a hybrid problem. Like Sébastien Buemi, Marcel Fässler no longer has any title chances.
After the early retirement of their only rival, Alexandre Imperatori, Mathéo Tuscher and Dominik Kraihamer (A) drove to a lonely class victory in sixth place overall. As a result, Rebellion Racing once again won the FIA trophy for LMP1 privateer teams. In 2017, the British-flagged team of Lausanne industrialist Alexandre Pesci is switching to the LMP2 class. With Germans Wolf Henzler and Christian Ried as teammates on a Porsche 911 RSR, Joël Camathias took third place in the GT private teams. This was the third podium finish in a row for the Ticino native.
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Photos: Adrenal Media
