FIA WEC Season 2021: 8 Hours of Bahrain qualifications & titles in play
Hypercar: must win for Toyota #8
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The title for the Hypercar World Endurance Drivers championship is out of control of the #8 team Brendon Hartley, Kazuki Nakajima and Sébastien Buemi. With Kamui Kobayashi gaining one more point thanks to his pole in qualifications today, the #8 Toyota team have now a 16 points deficit. The #8 team needs Kamui Kobayashi, Jose Maria Lopez and Mike Conway to abandon to clinch the title.
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LMP2: 4 teams mathematically in the run for the title
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Filipe Albuquerque secured the pole with his #22 United Autosports Oreca 07. United Autosports #22 and Philip Hanson need a win AND WRT #31 P6 or worse AND JOTA #28 P5 or worse to get the trophies.
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Thanks to their 6 Hours of Bahrein victory, #31 Team WRT clinched 7 points more than then-leading JOTA #28 and ended up leading the championship with 5 points. If one of those two wins the 8 Hours race, they will get the FIA Endurance Trophy for LMP2 teams and their drivers the FIA Endurance Trophy for LMP2 Drivers: Charles Milesi, Ferdinand Habsburg (P7 in qualifications) and Robin Frijns for #31 or Sean Gelael, Stoffel Vandoorne and Tom Blomqvist (P9 in qualifications) for #28.
JOTA #38 with Anthony Davidson, Antonio Felix Da Costa (P3 in qualifications) and Roberto Gonzales needs a win AND WRT #31 P4 or worse AND sister #28 P3 or worse to clinch both titles.
Those are mathematically the ones still in play to win the trophies.
LMP2 PRO/AM title in play between 3 teams
TDS Racing has 2 chances out of 3 to win the new titles as they support Racing Team Nederland #29 (129 points) and Realteam Racing #70 (119 points). Dragonspeed #21 is currently second with 120 points. The winner will clinch both championships.
Giedo van der Garde (P4 in qualifications), Frits van Eerd et Job van Uitert (Racing Team Nederland #29) won the last 6 hours in front of Norman Nato (P2 in qualifications), Esteban Garcia et Loïc Duval (Realteam Racing #70). Juan Pablo Montoya (P8 in qualifications), Ben Hanley and Hendrik Hendman (Dragonspeed #21) ended last at the 6 Hours of Bahrein after having to deal with several problems.
LMGTE: Porsche #92 and Ferrari #51 now equal
Wednesday, we had good news in GTE classes in anticipation of the next 8 Hours of Bahrain, as the Ferrari 488 GTE Evo had been given a power increase of roughly half of the power cut it received prior to last weekend’s 6 Hours of Bahrain.
This meant both GTE PRO Ferrari would be more competitive.
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In today’s qualifications, Kevin Estre achieved the best lap in the GTE-PRO thereby clinching one point for the Championship. Two teams (#51 and #92) are now leading with the same number of points. If both leaders don’t finish the 8 hours race tomorrow Kevin Estre and Neel Jani (Porsche 911 RSR #92) will clinch the FIA GTE World Endurance Driver’s championship as they have one more victory than James Calado and Alessandro Pier Guidi with their Ferrari 488 GTE Evo. The #51 pair is second on the grid for 0.160 sec. Bruni with Porsche #91 is third and Serra with Ferrari #52 is fourth, all within 0.562 sec.
This should provide us with a new Mano a Mano between the 2 Porsche 911 RSR-19 and the 2 AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE Evo. It also promises a fair battle between Calado-Pier Guidi driving the #51 Ferrari and Estre -Jani at the wheel of #92 Porsche RSR-19 for the FIA World Endurance Driver’s championship. A victory means the title win.
Porsche is now ahead of Ferrari by 2 points in the Manufacturers' Championship.
GTE AM titles in the hand of #83 AF Corse and #33 TF Sport
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Roberto Lacorte driving Cetilar Racing Ferrari #47 succeeded the best lap in qualifications this afternoon.
The FIA Endurance Trophy for GTE AM teams and FIA endurance trophy for GTE AM drivers are in play between AF Corse #83 and TF Sport #33. With a comfortable advantage of 21,5 points the Ferrari 488 GTE Evo drivers (P2 for Perrodo in qualifications), however, have a serious advantage to their opponents Ben Keating (5th in qualifications), Dylan Pereira and Filipe Fraga, driving the Aston Martin Vantage #33. The latter needs a win AND AF Corse #83 P5 or worse to clinch the titles. In case the Ferrari 488 GTE Evo does not finish the race (which never happened this season), the Aston Martin Vantage drivers need at least P3 to win the titles.
The power increase granted to the Ferrari 488 GTE Evo is of importance in the GTE AM class, as the AF Corse #83 Ferrari GTE Evo of François Perrodo, Nicklas Nielsen and Alessio Rivera will have a faster car to defend their leading position in the AM championships (team and drivers).
