Porsche: Toyota, Ferrari Still “Step Above” in Hypercar Pace

Photo: MPS Agency

Porsche LMDh factory director Urs Kuratle believes that Toyota and Ferrari are still a “step above” in outright pace to Porsche and others in the Hypercar class heading into Hyperpole for the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

The German manufacturer got two of its four Porsche 963s in the top-eight in Wednesday’s qualifying to advance to this evening’s final qualifying session that will set the sharp end of the grid.

Antonio Fuoco’s benchmark 3:25.213 lap in the No. 50 Ferrari 499P was more than six-tenths clear of the the quickest Porsche in the hands of Frederic Makowiecki.

The No. 7 Toyota GR010 Hybrid of Kamui Kobayashi that led the way for the Japanese manufacturer, meanwhile, was nearly four-tenths quicker than the Frenchman’s No. 5 Porsche Penske Motorsport entry.

“I think they are still a step above,” Kuratle told Sportscar365. “Also the times you can see. I certainly think they are still ahead of Porsche at least.

“We’ll see a bit more today and hopefully the rest of the truth on Sunday during the race.”

Kuratle said he doesn’t expect times to significantly take a tumble in Hyperpole, at least from Porsche.

“For us it will not be one or two seconds,” he said. “This is quite sure. For the others, I don’t know, it’s difficult to say really.

“All I can see is that based on what we know, we don’t expect a big jump.

“There will be a track evolution, we all know, that’s a normal thing. But other than this, there will not be big jumps.”

Toyota Gazoo Racing WEC technical director Pascal Vasselon agreed with Kuratle in that it’s unclear how much faster the times will be this evening.

Brendon Hartley scored pole last year with a 3:24.408 lap time.

“Every time we see there’s a sequence of things happening, probably drivers getting more up to speed, the track improving. Every time we see another step for the Hyperpole,” Vasselon said.

“To guess if it will be in the [three minute] 24 or 25 [seconds], it’s very difficult. It’s a guess because it’s not something which can be easily simulated or predicted.”

Vasselon said they’ve been making improvements “everywhere” since the test day, which had Ferrari AF Corse atop the time sheets in both sessions.

“Our engineers have made a step compared to the test day,” he said. “How big? We’re still not sure, but we’ve made a step.

“I think we have been quite please with the outcome because we are happy to be in the Hyperpole top eight, which was our target.

“We’re quite happy with what our engineers have done between the test day and yesterday.”

Ferrari Predicts LMDh Cars to be “Fully Part of the Game” in Race

Ferdinando Cannizzo, Ferrari’s head of endurance race cars, meanwhile, believes that the LMDh cars from Porsche and Cadillac will be “fully part of the game” come race day.

“Apart from that, they have proven that the reliability is there,” he said. “They can rely on the fact that some systems are common throughout the platform, so it’s easy for them to achieve quite good reliability levels.

“I do believe that they will be competitive and not in the same situation that we faced in the previous races, in which it seems that Toyota were too fast and Ferrari was the second force in the championship. They will be there.”

He added: “Since the start, we are progressing step by step, every race and in the tests we have done.

“We are learning the car. The more we run, the more we understand how it works.

“The pace was not bad, and I think we still have room for improvement. I expect the fight will be really tough. I think all the people will be there.”

Daniel Lloyd contributed to this report

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John