BMW Edges Porsche in Tight Fuji FP2

BMW led the way in second practice for this weekend’s 6 Hours of Fuji round of the FIA World Endurance Championship, as Dries Vanthoor narrowly eclipsed Porsche driver Matt Campbell to set the day’s fastest time.

Vanthoor posted a best time of 1:29.577 aboard the No. 15 BMW M Hybrid V8 early in Friday afternoon’s session, having become the first driver of the weekend to break through the 90-second barrier.

Not long after, Campbell put the No. 5 Penske Porsche 963 up to second, just nine thousandths of a second slower than Vanthoor.

Alex Lynn went third-fastest for Cadillac, getting within 0.015 seconds of the fastest time aboard the solo No. 2 Cadillac V-Series.R.

Best of the Ferrari 499Ps was the Circuit of The Americas-winning No. 83 car of Robert Kubica in fourth, just over three tenths off the pace, while Toyota’s lead car, the No. 8 GR010 Hybrid of Ryo Hirakawa, rounded off the top five.

Robin Frijns made it two BMWs in the top six with a time 0.379 seconds slower than Vanthoor, beating Antonio Giovinazzi’s No. 51 Ferrari and Oliver Rasmussen in the best of the Hertz Team JOTA Porsches.

In LMGT3, Alessio Rovera put the No. 55 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3 at the head of the timesheets with a 1:40.682 set towards the end of the 90-minute session.

That was slightly slower than the 1:40.528 effort with which United Autosports McLaren driver Marino Sato topped Friday morning’s opening practice.

An early effort from Bronze-rated Hiroshi Koizumi was enough to put the No. 82 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R second, with Franck Perera third-fastest in the No. 60 Iron Lynx Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2.

The session ran green for its entire distance, except for a brief full-course yellow systems test at the one-hour mark.

Fuji track action continues with Free Practice 3 on Saturday morning at 10:20 a.m. local time (Friday 9:20 p.m. EDT).

RESULTS: Free Practice 2