Toyota wins at the 6 Hours of Monza

If everything has not been rosy at Toyota, the brand pockets the 6 Hours of Monza this Sunday, last test before the meeting of the 24 Hours of Le Mans (August 21-22).

At the start of the last hour of the race, the No. 010 Toyota GR7 was in the lead, before a sixth pass through the pit lane, replacing the lead.Alpine A480 n°36 in the lead, before the latter stopped 40′ from the finish.

However, there will be no consumption race, since the GR010 n°7 will benefit from a final free stop under FCY 30′ from the end, set up to remove debris on the track.

Which allows the trio Jose Maria Lopez – Kamui Kobayashi - Mike conway to win in the end with a 1′ margin over the crew Andre Negro – Matthieu Vaxivière – Nicolas lapierre, which will once again not be unworthy. This is the first success for the No. 7 this season.

In the Hypercar clan, the Glickenhaus No. 709 of Richard Westbrook – Franck Mailleux – Romain Dumas, led for a few seconds shortly after halfway, but lost its footing following brake problems. Too bad for the American who ultimately finished 4th overall and 3rd in the category, but Glickenhaus can be satisfied with this last encouraging rehearsal before Le Mans.

The second Toyota n°8 of Sébastien Buemi - Kazuki Nakajima - Brendon Hartley was hit by several problems, including one with the fuel pump, having forced it to return to the box several times, causing it to plunge in the ranking. The second Glickenhaus of Pla – Derani – Menezes retired following a gearbox problem, after experiencing a spark plug problem at the start of the race.

Avatars in Hypercar, which benefit the Oreca 07 n°22 – United Autosports of Fabio Scherer – Filipe Albuquerque – Phil Hanson, winner in LM P2 and third overall in these 6 Hours of Monza.

The category podium is completed by the No. 07 Oreca 31 – Team WRT of Robin Frijns – Charles Milesi – Ferdinand Habsburg and the No. 07 Oreca 29 – Racing Team Nederland of Paul-Loup Chatin – Frits van Eerd – Nyck de Vries, winners in LM P2 Pro-Am.

Porsche wins on Italian soil in GTE Pro with the 911 RSR n°92 by Kévin Estre and Neel Jani, who were able to shake off the incessant pressure for six hours from Alessandro Pier Guidi and James Calado (Ferrari n°51), the latter being however obliged to stop two minutes from the goal for additional fuel.

Gianmaria Bruni and Richard Lietz completed the podium with the #911 91 ahead of the #52 Ferrari of Miguel Molina and Daniel Serra.

The Prancing Horse, however, triumphed in GTE Am with the #83 Ferrari – AF Corse of François Perrodo – Nicklas Nielsen – Alessio Rovera. Augusto Farfus (Aston Martin n°98 – AMR) stole second place from Tomonobu Fujii (Aston Martin n°777 – D’Station Racing) on ​​the last lap.

Discover the full report and analysis of the 6 Hours of Monza, in AUTO issue 2321hebdo, available tomorrow evening in digital version and this Wednesday on newsstands.