TOYOTA GAZOO Racing defends its remarkable home record in the 6 Hours of Fuji this weekend in the penultimate race of the 2023 the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) season.
The reigning World Champions have won eight of the nine WEC races in Japan since returning to top-level endurance racing in 2012, including a run of five consecutive victories since 2016, making Fuji Speedway the team’s most successful circuit.
The historic racetrack, located 100km west of Tokyo, is very much a home race for TOYOTA GAZOO Racing and the GR010 HYBRID, whose hybrid powertrain is designed, developed and built at the nearby Higashi-Fuji Technical Center,
TOYOTA GAZOO Racing aims for a fifth victory in 2023, which could secure the manufacturers’ World Championship for a fifth consecutive season. The team leads Hypercar rivals Ferrari by 26 points and will secure the crown if it outscores the Italian marque by 13 points in Fuji.
An exciting four-way battle for the drivers’ World Championship between both TOYOTA GAZOO Racing and Ferrari crews will go down to the wire in Bahrain on 4 November, regardless of the result in Japan.
Victory last time out at Monza for Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and José María López in the #7 GR010 HYBRID put them back in a three-way World Championship battle. They are second in the standings heading to Fuji, 23 points behind Sébastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley and Ryo Hirakawa in the #8 GR010 HYBRID.
“It’s great to go to Fuji Speedway for our home race at the top of both World Championships, and we are focused on tightening our grip with a strong result this weekend,” commented Hartley. “We saw in Monza how close the competition is, and how a small mistake here or there can have a big impact on the result, so we need to be on the top of our game.
“I’m sure it will be another great battle, particularly with Ferrari who have looked very quick all year, but that’s what we all want and we’re ready for the challenge.”
Another enthusiastic Japanese crowd is expected to cheer on a 12-car Hypercar field, featuring competitors from Cadillac, Ferrari, Peugeot and Porsche as part of the biggest grid of top-class prototypes at the 6 Hours of Fuji in the modern WEC era.
Fans will get the first chance to see the Hypercars in action around the 4.563km track, which is the shortest on the WEC calendar despite its 1.5km start-finish straight, on Friday when free practice begins with two 90-minute sessions. A final one-hour practice on Saturday morning sets the scene for the grid-defining qualifying, before the 6 Hours of Fuji begins at 11am local time, 4am CEST, on Sunday 10 September.
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