{"id":2789,"date":"2026-09-25T06:55:27","date_gmt":"2026-09-25T09:55:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/?p=2789"},"modified":"2026-09-25T06:55:28","modified_gmt":"2026-09-25T09:55:28","slug":"alpine-overturns-toyota-lead-as-fuji-wec-practice-opens-with-tight-margins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/endurance\/wec\/alpine-overturns-toyota-lead-as-fuji-wec-practice-opens-with-tight-margins\/","title":{"rendered":"Alpine overturns Toyota lead as Fuji WEC practice opens with tight margins"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">News Summary<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Toyota\u2019s #8 led FP1 at Fuji with Ry\u014d Hirakawa\u2019s 1:29.694<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Victor Martins placed the #36 Alpine on top of FP2 with a 1:29.304<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Augusto Farfus finished seventh in LMGT3 in FP1 before Ford led the class in FP2<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Toyota and Alpine shared the opening day honours at the 6 Hours of Fuji as the FIA World Endurance Championship returned to Japan on Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Home driver Ry\u014d Hirakawa established the initial benchmark by taking the #8 Toyota TR010 Hybrid to the top of FP1. Victor Martins responded during the afternoon, placing the #36 Alpine A424 ahead of Aston Martin and Alpine\u2019s sister car in an extremely close FP2.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Only 0.093s covered the leading three Hypercars in the second session<\/strong>, while Genesis, Aston Martin and Cadillac also showed enough performance to challenge Toyota and Alpine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Hirakawa puts Toyota on top at home<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hirakawa completed FP1 with a <strong>1:29.694<\/strong> in the #8 Toyota shared with S\u00e9bastien Buemi and Brendon Hartley.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Japanese driver beat the #12 Cadillac of Will Stevens and Norman Nato by 0.343s. Ferrari\u2019s #50 499P took third, 0.509s behind Toyota, followed by the #38 Cadillac and the #36 Alpine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Genesis placed its #19 GMR-001 sixth on the manufacturer\u2019s first visit to Fuji, while Aston Martin\u2019s #007 Valkyrie took seventh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Toyota\u2019s #7 entry, driven by Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Nyck de Vries, finished eighth. The #83 AF Corse Ferrari and championship-leading #51 Ferrari completed the top ten.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The session reinforced Toyota\u2019s traditional strength at its home circuit. The Japanese manufacturer is chasing a <strong>tenth WEC victory at Fuji<\/strong>, although the small gaps suggested that the weekend would not become a private Toyota contest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Alpine leads ultra-close FP2 at Fuji<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Alpine moved to the front during the second 90-minute session as Martins completed a <strong>1:29.304<\/strong> in the #36 A424 shared with Jules Gounon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tom Gamble placed the #007 Aston Martin Valkyrie second, only <strong>0.039s behind<\/strong>, while the #35 Alpine of Ferdinand Habsburg and Charles Milesi completed the top three at +0.093s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The #19 Genesis took fourth before Andr\u00e9 Lotterer, Pipo Derani and Mathys Jaubert placed the #17 Genesis fifth, <strong>0.254s away from Martins<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Aston Martin\u2019s #009 was sixth, ahead of the #38 Cadillac. FP1 leader Toyota fell to eighth with the #8 car, while Peugeot\u2019s #93 and Cadillac\u2019s #12 completed the top ten.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Two Full Course Yellow periods were required to remove debris around Turn 3, but the interruptions did not prevent teams from completing substantial long-run programmes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">McLaren and Ford share LMGT3 honours<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">McLaren controlled the opening LMGT3 session with a one-two. Finn Gehrsitz led the class in the #58 Garage 59 McLaren, ahead of the sister #10 entry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Augusto Farfus placed the #32 Team WRT BMW <strong>seventh in LMGT3 during FP1<\/strong>, keeping the Brazilian crew within the competitive midfield group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ford moved ahead in FP2 as Ben Tuck completed a <strong>1:39.828<\/strong> aboard the #77 Proton Competition Mustang. The #79 Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG finished only 0.035s behind, with the #78 Akkodis ASP Lexus third.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Farfus, Darren Leung and Sean Gelael ended FP2 with a 1:40.763 in the #32 BMW, placing them 14th in LMGT3 and 31st overall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The third free-practice session takes place on Saturday at <strong>01:30 UK time<\/strong>, followed by qualifying at 06:00. The 6 Hours of Fuji starts on Sunday at <strong>03:00 UK time<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>GRANDE PR\u00caMIO<\/strong> follows the latest news and results from the <a href=\"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/endurance\/wec\/\">FIA World Endurance Championship<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">WEC, IMSA and endurance: FAQ<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What time does the 2026 6 Hours of Fuji start?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The race starts on Sunday at <strong>11:00 JST<\/strong>, equivalent to <strong>03:00 UK, 22:00 ET Saturday, 07:30 India, 12:00 Australia and 15:00 New Zealand<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How can I watch the 6 Hours of Fuji?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The race is available through <strong>FIAWEC+<\/strong>, with additional coverage offered by regional WEC broadcast partners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Who was fastest in practice for the 6 Hours of Fuji?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The #8 Toyota led FP1 with Ry\u014d Hirakawa\u2019s <strong>1:29.694<\/strong>, before Victor Martins put the #36 Alpine on top of FP2 with a <strong>1:29.304<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Who was fastest in Fuji WEC FP1?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ry\u014d Hirakawa led FP1 with a 1:29.694 in the #8 Toyota TR010 Hybrid.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ry\u014d Hirakawa put Toyota\u2019s #8 Hypercar on top in FP1 before Victor Martins led an Alpine-Aston Martin-Alpine top three separated by 0.093s in FP2<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1020315906,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"42wp_featured_image_caption":"Alpine answers Toyota as top three split by 0.093s","42wp_featured_image_credits":"Antonin Vincent\/DPPI","42wp_featured_video":"","42wp_featured_image_hidden":false,"42wp_authors_list":[{"id":48,"location":""}],"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[582,202,616,103],"42wp_author":[48],"class_list":["post-2789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wec","tag-6-hours-of-fuji","tag-alpine","tag-fia-wec","tag-toyota","42wp_author-giovani-danjo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2789"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2791,"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2789\/revisions\/2791"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1020315906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2789"},{"taxonomy":"42wp_author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandepremio.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/42wp_author?post=2789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}