Toyota’s ‘Virtual Championship’ Jibe After ‘Perfect’ 6H Spa

Photo: Toyota

Toyota Gazoo Racing Europe technical director David Floury has said the Japanese marque is fighting its own “virtual championship” against Porsche after only finishing fourth despite its ‘perfect’ execution in the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps.

Floury made the pointed remarks, which took clear aim at the FIA World Endurance Championship’s current Balance of Performance despite not naming the system directly, after the No. 8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid of Sebastien Buemi, Ryo Hirakawa and Brendon Hartley finished fourth in Belgium having qualified 15th.

Toyota boosted its points haul further as the sister No. 7 car of Kamui Kobayashi, Nyck de Vries and Mike Conway ended up seventh from 16th on the grid.

Amid the GR010 Hybrid’s lack of one-lap pace, which followed a significant decrease in maximum power and a small increase in weight in the BoP since the previous round at Imola, Floury said that even a single point in the race would have been “welcome”.

Asked post-race for his opinion on Toyota’s actual score of 18, Floury quipped that “it’s more than one, but less than 44,” referring to the amount scored by Ferrari with its 1-2 finish at Spa, plus pole position.

Alluding to the struggles of Porsche, which scored a best finish of ninth at Spa, he added: “It seems we have our own championship with Porsche; we have been fighting with them most of the time, so I think we should create our own ‘virtual’ championship to remind us of the days when we could fight for a world championship!”

The No. 8 Toyota jumped up the order in the closing part of the race after moving on to an offset strategy after the final safety car period with an early penultimate stop, allowing Buemi to drive the closing part of the race in clear air.

Conversely, Toyota opted to keep the No. 7 car on a more conventional strategy of making a final ‘splash’ in case a caution period ruined the No. 8 crew’s strategic gambit.

“If you told me [after qualifying] we would have one car in P7, I would have signed for it,” said Floury. “For sure, we have won races executing not as well as today. So we can proud of what we have achieved since the start of the season.

“Obviously others are making mistakes and we have avoided them and we have extracted every bit of what we can extract. It’s satisfying to show again we are strong as a team, but in the end we cannot be pleased.

“It’s not what we come to race for. We race to be competitive. We are not and it is not on pure merit.

“We executed to perfection. We have been told if we execute to perfection, we stand a chance, but we never stood a chance.”

Toyota jumped BMW for second in the manufacturers’ championship at Spa, but 65 points behind runaway leader Ferrari ahead of next month’s 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Floury reiterated the fears he first expressed after Imola that Ferrari is on course to win the championship with races to spare, saying he fears it could damage fan interest.

“Obviously if Ferrari has a good Le Mans, the championship chances of everyone else would be very little,” he said.

“As a promoter of the championship, I would be not so happy, because the interest in the championship in the second half of the season will be very low. This is a fact.

“[The championship] is what we want to achieve through all the tools we have, which I cannot speak about. It’s not up to me to manage this part.

“The part we have control over, we try to optimize, and we showed again today we are strong, one of the very best in the pit lane.

“I am happy that we showed the mindset of the team, our never-give-up approach in front of our TGR-E employees and the top management coming from Japan to support us for this race. I am happy we delivered a strong race for them.”

Asked by Sportscar365 whether the frustration of not being able to compete for wins in the first half of the season strengthens Toyota’s determination at Le Mans, which runs to a separate BoP, Floury said: “Obviously the target is to finish one-two.

“This is the only way we can stay in the fight for the championship, so the target is clear, especially after the last two years which felt like after the first three races of this season.

“We are eager to fight. For sure you can count on us to be pushing hard as we have done in every race since the start of the season.”