Toyota insists it is not the “quickest” despite topping Le Mans test day

Brendon Hartley insists Toyota does not have the “quickest car” over long runs at the Le Mans 24 Hours, despite setting the fastest time in Sunday’s official test day.

Hartley posted a 3m26.246s lap in the #8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid he shares with Sebastien Buemi and Ryo Hirakawa, placing the Japanese manufacturer on top of the timesheets at the Circuit de la Sarthe.

The performance marked a notable improvement from last year’s test, when Toyota finished third and more than seven tenths adrift of the benchmark time set by Porsche.

Toyota has been granted a maximum output of 520kW below 250km/h under the latest Balance of Performance changes, the joint-highest figure for any LMH or LMDh car heading into the centrepiece round of the World Endurance Championship.

Despite the headline lap time, Hartley was cautious about Toyota’s prospects of securing a sixth Le Mans victory, pointing to the fierce competition in the Hypercar field.

“I think we are feeling positive after a successful day with no major dramas,” he said.

“I had a good feeling with the car, and I think Ryo and Seb did too. Clearly the competition is fierce, and on long runs I wouldn’t say we look like the quickest car, but I feel like we are in the fight. We have some work to do next week.

“Hopefully get some good sleep in the next nights, recharge and be ready for the big job to come.”

Hartley’s teammate Buemi also expects a number of other cars to be in the mix in the 93rd edition of Le Mans.

“I always enjoy coming back to this circuit; it’s a real pleasure to drive a Hypercar around here,” he said.

“And of course, it’s nice to set the fastest lap obviously – but there are a lot of fast cars out there.
“We did a lot of laps, made some changes which were good, others which were less so, but that’s part of the process. We will analyse everything and see where we can improve.

“Plus, the weather conditions might be a bit different next week, so we need to get ready to adapt to that as well.”

With teams typically focusong on long runs and optimising the set-up on the test day, instead of chasing outright performance, Hirakawa underlined that Sunday's times don’t offer a clear picture of the competitive order.

“It was quite a busy day, as expected, with a lot of things to test and all the different slow zones, full course yellows and red flags,” he said.

“We got what we wanted out of the day, so it has gone well. It’s always nice to be fastest, even though it doesn’t mean anything at this stage.

“The car felt really good but still we have a lot of things we can improve so there should be more to come. We have to analyse the data over the next two days and prepare the best we can for race week.”

The sister #7 Toyota crewed by Kamui Kobayashi, Mike Conway and Nyck de Vries ended up 14th in the overall classification, more than two seconds down on the #8 LMH.