Points-Leading Toyota Loses Fourth in Post-Race Penalty

The Hypercar world championship-leading No. 8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid has lost its fourth-place finish at the 6 Hours of Monza due to a post-race penalty totaling 50 seconds.

The car driven by Brendon Hartley, Sebastien Buemi and Ryo Hirakawa was found to have exceeded its maximum power output of 507 kW on the 190th lap of Sunday’s race.

A stewards’ report stated that a stop-and-go penalty of five seconds plus an additional 45 seconds was added to the Toyota’s final race time after it committed two offenses.

The extra 45 seconds is based on a rule from the WEC that all stop-and-go sanctions not taken before the end of the race will receive time added on.

The penalty has provisionally dropped the No. 8 Toyota to sixth position and promoted the No. 5 Penske Porsche 963 of Frederic Makowiecki, Michael Christensen and Dane Cameron to fourth.

It has also moved the No. 51 Ferrari 499P driven by Antonio Giovinazzi, Alessandro Pier Guidi and James Calado into the top five.

That provisionally undoes the points gain that the No. 8 Toyota crew made on the Ferrari AF Corse trio and reduces the margin between the two lineups to 23 points.

Hartley, Buemi and Hirakawa would have left Monza with a 29-point lead without the penalty, which is not open to appeal.

Additionally, the No. 51 Ferrari drivers would have dropped behind the race-winning Toyota lineup of Kamui Kobayashi, Mike Conway and Brendon Hartley, until the Japanese manufacturer’s other car was penalized. Those two crews are now level on points.