Toyota TS040 Beating Porsche and Audi in first 2014 WEC Race at Silverstone

In the qualifying rounds, Alex Wurz and Kazuki Nakajima qualified the No.7 TS040, which they share with Stephane Sarrazin, at the head of the pack by a tiny margin of just 0.005 seconds.

On the other hand, the No.8 of Anthony Davidson, Nicolas Lapierre and Sebastien Buemi got qualified on fifth, having missed most of the final practice session due to a super capacitor issue.

The TS040 HYBRIDs were at the heart of the action with several position changes before rain came around the 40-minute mark. Both cars pitted for new tires, the #7 taking wets and the #8 hybrid intermediates.

With the rain soon easing, hybrid intermediate tyres proved the most effective and Sébastien used his four-wheel drive hybrid system to good effect in building a comfortable lead.

Alex lacked grip on the wets so dropped to third and, after around 90 minutes, handed over the #7 to Kazuki, who switched to slicks for the rapidly-drying track. The #8 did likewise soon after when Nicolas took over from Sébastien.

Conditions remained dry, allowing Nicolas to firmly establish the #8 in the lead, with Kazuki tightening his grip on second in the #7 before swapping with Stéphane soon after the halfway point.

In the meantime, one of Porsche’s racecars had to retire while the other one took second third place. Unfortunately for Audi though, mechanical problems determined the team to pit both its vehicles, thus not getting any points this race.

Seems Toyota is doing pretty good lately, as it took first place in 2013 WEC’s last race at Bahrain (although it was because of heavy rain and Audi decided to pit for new tires, leaving Toyota in first place, after which officials ended the race) and the first race in the 2014 season.

But let’s not jinx it, because Toyota Racing had the most retirements last year, mostly due to mechanical failures.