Sunday’s WEC race at Interlagos will be remembered for a number of reasons. It was the FIA WEC’s first race on South American soil in a decade, attracted a huge crowd of more than 70,000 fans and produced a historic result, with Toyota’s Sebastien Buemi becoming the first driver to reach the 25 overall win mark.
The Swiss still stands alone as the driver with the most wins in the championship’s history after a dominant performance from the Japanese brand, which looked back to its old self for the first time in 2023.
It’s a truly remarkable achievement for Buemi, who has carved out a lengthy and successful career in sportscar racing since his departure from Formula 1 at the end of the 2011 season and will surely go down as one of the endurance racing’s greats when he hangs up his helmet.
It was also the first race of the season in which a team has run away and taken a comfortable victory. Toyota was a fuel issue for the No.7 GR010 away from a dominant formation finish. It will have felt almost ominous for the rest of the teams in the paddock. Had you squinted your eyes during the race, you would have been transported back to the 2023 season, where the majority of races were controlled and won by Toyota.
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But this is a season which has been anything but a procession. No pole-sitting car, in either class, has won a race yet, and five different Hypercars have won the first five races of the season. We are in the midst of a chapter in the championship’s history that looks destined to leave us all wanting more when the checkered flag falls in Bahrain in November.
And when that day comes at the end of the season, we may look back on the 2024 6 Hours of Sao Paulo very differently. We may think of it as the turning point in the season, in which the No. 6 Penske and No. 92 Pure Rxcing crews seized the moment and solidified their world championship title hopes.
In Hypercar, the performance from Laurens Vanthoor and later Andre Lotterer and Kevin Estre in response to the puncture caused by the clash with the No. 12 Jota Porsche on the run down to Turn 4 early in the race was simply outstanding.
When the first hour came to a close the No. 6 Porsche was 19th overall and a lap down. Five hours later, it had risen to second and finished on the same lap as the No. 8.
In conversation with RACER after the podium celebrations, Lotterer was visibly shocked by the result.
“We impressed ourselves because when you have an incident like that in a competitive field you think it’s going to be a tough day and hard to recover,” he said.
“We didn’t give up, Laurens fought back immediately, then I got in and took us to P4, a full course yellow helped us and then Kevin got in and it all went smooth. It’s really good to score points like this because we aimed to hold the lead in the standings.”
By finishing second, the No. 6 trio now hold a 19-point lead at the top of the table over the No. 50 Ferrari trio of Antonio Fuoco, Miguel Molina and Nicklas Nielsen who struggled to produce a worthy encore after their famous Le Mans win just one month ago.
Pure Rxcing’s performance in LMGT3 deserves just as much praise and recognition, but for a very different reason. This was not a fightback through the field to salvage a strong result from a dire position, instead, it was an all-conquering Tour De Force from a team which throughout its debut season has stood out from the crowd in an extremely deep category.
Leaving aside the fact that Pure Rxcing’s Porsche found a way to win so comfortably while carrying success ballast, the victory will have felt sweet for Alex Malykhin, Joel Sturm and Klaus Bachler because it came on a day in which its closest title rivals faltered.
It was a catastrophic day for the EMA crew, which was dealt a penalty early and then ended up in the garage after an incident with the No. 54 Vista Ferrari at Turn 1. Having been joint top in the standings going into the meeting, they are now 25 points back.
The No. 31 WRT BMW’s day wasn’t much better. A penalty, followed by a lack of pace was a combination that produced a 10th-place finish. Only a single point was scored and its drivers are now 26 points adrift.
Both cars will need a rip-roaring run through COTA and Fuji and Bahrain to ensure the race for the championship goes down to the wire.
And that’s the main focus now. Gone are the days when teams were constantly focused on the Le Mans 24 Hours and designing a car more suited to the unique characteristics of the Circuit de La Sarthe. Just look at Ferrari and its new 499P “Joker” package. It’s won Le Mans twice in two years, yet it is pushing for more, not just more success at Le Mans, but more success at the shorter WEC races.
If the 2024 season has taught us anything so far, it’s that the world championship finally feels like it matters. With so many factory teams and star drivers now involved, each event has felt like a big deal and since Qatar each race has been held in front of a bumper crowd.
With three races to go it’s advantage Porsche, in both classes. Can anyone topple the German giant? It’s going to be a lot of fun finding out…