Toyota TS030 Hybrid Wins First Race

Toyota has won its first race with its new TS030 Hybrid Le Mans prototype, having led from start to finish in the Six Hours of Sao Paulo at Brazil’s famous Interlagos race track over the weekend. The Brazilian race was the fifth round of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC), with the Toyota factory team, Toyota Racing, winning it in dominating style.

Drivers Alex Wurz and Nicolas Lapierre started from pole position as the #7 TS030 Hybrid maintained its record of having led at some point in every race in which it has competed. In total, the duo made 247 laps during the six hours of the race, which included seven pit stops.


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Designer1 - 9/17/2012 2:47:50 PM

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Wonderful, congrats to Toyota!!

MercedesSL - 9/17/2012 3:03:04 PM

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Very impressive! Only their 3rd race and they beat Audi's R18. The 24h of LM will be very exciting next year.

lexworld - 9/17/2012 3:20:51 PM

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Wow! Just when you thought Toyota is starting to dominate NASCAR now Hybrid Techno. Relentless!

Phantom4 - 9/18/2012 8:33:15 AM

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They didn’t just beat Audi they dominated them. Storming to pole, and leading the race flag to flag. Congrates to Toyota, Audi has been in the sport for over 10 years, and Toyota beats them in their cars 3rd race ever!

chewy - 9/18/2012 2:10:59 PM

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Kinda like winning a preseason game.

94geo - 9/18/2012 2:22:41 PM

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It’s part of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC). I don’t think the teams spent a small fortune to transport the cars, tractor trailers, pit crew, engineers, and team pavilions... ect, across the Atlantic to Brazil just for practice lol.

chewy - 9/18/2012 2:57:50 PM

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There is Le Mans, then Sebring, then Petit LeMans and then the rest. One is like the Championship, the other is like "playoffs" and then you have "regular season" and preseason. Sure it counts but in Endurance racing a 6 hour race is towards the bottom.

94geo - 9/18/2012 3:13:22 PM

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Interesting opinion, but a race is a race. They all race to win.

chewy - 9/18/2012 4:01:19 PM

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True but you design a car with a driving force behind it. And in endurance racing it's building the car that will cover the most laps in 24 hours.

AlleVier - 9/18/2012 5:55:45 PM

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I'm not going to dismiss Toyota's win as a non-achievement, congratulations to them. But I'm with chewy on the hierarchy of the endurance events. The R18 e-tron has been designed to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans in a particular way; don't be the fastest, but be fast enough, pit fewer times, and be ready for the rain. We knew the TS030 would be fast and that, with rear-wheel drive boost available, all the time and at any speed, it would likely be a contender in a 6-hour race.

Question is, will Toyota ever consistently win the 24 Hours of Le Mans with their set up or will they be, like Peugeot, fast but only good for a few wins here and there?