Porsche Penske won the Drver’s Championship, and Toyota Gazoo claimed the Manufactorer’s title in the Hypercar division.
SAKIR, Bahrain—Porsche Penske Motorsport led most of the World Endurance Championship in the hypercar division. Saturday night on this Middle East Circuit was a different outcome as Toyota Gazoo’s Sebastian Buemi overcame an earlier problem and won the Bapco Eight Hours of Bahrain with his teammates Brendon Hartley and Rio Hirakawa. They defeated their rivals by only two points, giving his team the Manufacturer’s Championship for the fourth consecutive year.
Although Penske Porsche Motorsport lost the Manufacturer’s title, the squad still won the Driver’s championship. Andre Lotterer, Laurens Vanthoor, and Kevin Estre finished outside the top ten, which was still enough to give them enough to win the title. For Lotterer, it was the second time he had won a championship with the German manufacturer.
Toyota took the lead early, but in the first few laps, Buemi was struck by the TF Sport car and spun around. The Swiss managed to recover, and by the end of the race, he found himself moving up the grid. That was enough to pass Porsche’s Matt Campbell for the lead, open a good gap, and eventually take the victory. For Campbell, things got worse when the Ferrari 499P, driven by Antonio Giovinazzi, passed the Briton and took second place, with Campbell and his team finishing on the last step of the podium.
Toyota’s second car, driven by Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi, and Nyck De Vries, was unlucky. An electrical problem ruined their race, and the car had to be retired just an hour before the end. Peugeot’s Paul Di Resta also pulled off the circuit with engine issues a couple of hours at the same moment.
In the LMGT3 division, Ferrari’s AF Vista Corse team of Francois Heriau, Simon Mann, and Alessio Rovera won their second race, overtaking the TF Sport Corvettes two hours from the end and holding on to the victory. The Corvette duo took on each other for the second spot, where Daniel Juncadella held on for the runner-up position.
It was a five-car battle before the top three broke away in the last hour. But after the Manthey Purerxcing team had already clinched the championship in the previous round in Japan, the Lithuanian team of Aliaksandr Malykhin, Joel Sturm, and Klaus Bachler still finished in the top five. It was their first disappointing result since Lemans. Still, the team dominated the rest of the season, and two safety car periods occurred during the race, which allowed for a shootout for the remainder of the race.
For the new class and the Hypercar divisions, there were many different winners, which could make hope for many more races later.
