The 2022 FIA World Endurance Championship got underway today with the first practice session of the 1,000 Miles of Sebring. It was Scuderia Cameron Glickenhaus who came out on top of the first 60-minute session.
Two-time 24 Hours of Le Mans winner Romain Dumas led the way for Glickenhaus, taking the fastest lap of the session just past the 30-minute mark. The 1:49.738 came perfectly timed ahead of a short but heavy rain shower that put a ten-minute pause on the session. With a now wet track to contend with, no one could beat the Frenchman’s time making it the only 1m49s lap time of free practice one.
Before this time, Toyota Gazoo Racing had been leading the way, showing a great improvement after Balance of Performance (BoP) woes plagued their pace during the WEC Prologue. The #8 squad were third at the chequered flag with their 1:50.267 set by Sebastien Buemi after Alpine Elf Matmut driver Matthieu Vaxixiere went 0.004s faster.
The second Toyota came to the chequered flag fifth after the fastest LMP2 car – Realteam by WRT – took fourth thanks to Ferdinand Habsburg‘s 1:50.477. Jose Maria Lopez was two tenths down on Hasburg’s time in the #7 Toyota.
Hasburg had a strong advantage over the rest of the LMP2 field with none of the other cars in class getting within six-tenths of a second. Prema Powertrain were next on the timing board, sixth overall and second in class in the hands of Louis Deletraz, with Paul di Resta in the United Autosports and Rene Rast in reigning champion car Team WRT completing the overall top eight, class top four.
Back to form that is recognised in the WEC, it was Kevin Estre in the #92 Porsche GT Team who was leading the way in free practice, setting a benchmark of 1:58.827 to beat. But team mate in the sister car Gianmaria Bruni was certainly up for the challenge, missing out on the top spot by 0.054s at the chequered flag. The dominance of Porsche may be something to be weary of this weekend, as the third placed Corvette Racing entry was just under a second off Estre with their best lap set by Tommy Milner, and the duo of AF Corse Ferrari‘s failed to break the two-minute lap times.
It was half expected that there would be a BoP shift in GTE ahead of this weekend after the results of the Prologue, but no such changes have been made.
Matteo Cairoli led the GTE Am field in the #46 Team Project 1 with a 1:58.906. Adding to the Porsche supremacy that we may be seeing this weekend, the Am driver was able to go faster than the Pro Corvette and Ferraris, sitting third overall on the GTE timing screen. Second to fourth in Am – #88 Dempsey Proton Racing, #98 Northwest Aston Martin Racing and #56 Team Project 1 – were also able to finish ahead of the two Pro Ferraris, suggesting Ferrari-runners will be suffering most this weekend with the BoP weightings. The highest finishing Am Ferrari was the #71 Spirit of Race finishing sixth in class, 29th overall and six-tenths off class leader. The Spirit of Race was also faster than the slowest Pro Ferrari, #52, which was almost three seconds off Estre’s lap time.
The overall lap times this session were slower than the Prologue last weekend, but due to the rain washing over the track the rubber that had been set down has now been removed. As the weekend progresses and with the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship cars also rubbering up the track, lap times are expected to drop.
Practice resumes later on today, 20:35 GMT, where the teams can get back on track and Ferrari can search for the pace they seem to be lacking.
