MOTORSPORT: Webber's long road ends on a high

It’s over for Mark Webber, having helped three Porsche teammates become world champions, but the final day of the World Endurance Championship belonged to Audi, another “retiree” from prototype sports car racing.

Webber drove a Porsche 919 Hybrid to third place in the Six Hours of Bahrain, behind the two Audi R18 e-tron quattros.

Webber’s podium with his co-drivers, New Zealander Brendon Hartley and German Timo Bernhard, ensured the other Porsche trio – Switzerland’s Neel Jani, France’s Romain Dumas and Germany’s Marc Lieb, who finished only sixth, behind the two Toyota TS050s – won the WEC drivers’ championship, as Webber and his ‘mates’ did last year.

“I was the second and the last driver in the car today and pretty happy with both stints,” Webber said.

“Early in the race I had a nice little fight with one of Toyotas. I got past him and tried to pull away, but we didn’t have enough pace to fight Audi.

“Then for the final stint it was pretty emotional putting my helmet on for the last time.

“I enjoyed the last stint and I got the chance to bring the car to the chequered flag. A top-three finish was the maximum we could get today.

“It has been an incredible three years for me with Porsche, together with Timo and Brendon and the whole team.

“Nothing is forever though. I’m stopping at a good time.”

Webber, 40, who now becomes a ‘special representative’ for Porsche like German rally icon Walter Rohrl, was joined in Bahrain by many of his closest supporters and some he had mentored, including his successor as Australia’s Formula 1 star, Daniel Ricciardo.

But Audi were a cut above on the track. Starting from pole position, the 4.0-litre V6 diesel hybrid R18 of Brazilian Lucas di Grassi, Frenchman Loic Duval and Briton Oliver Jarvis led almost the entire race and di Grassi set the fastest lap.

The other Audi of Switzerland’s Marcel Fassler, Germany’s Andre Lotterer and Frenchman Benoit Treluyer finished 16 seconds behind, with Webber crossing the line a minute later.

Audi’s victory was its 107th in 187 outings in 18 years of prototype sports car endurance racing, including 13 victories in the 24 Hours of Le Mans this century.

However, it was only Audi’s second win in this year’s WEC. Porsche scored six wins this season – four of them with Webber’s car, the other two by the eventual drivers’ champions – while Toyota won only once, on its home soil in Japan.

While Toyota endured the heartbreak of seeing a first Le Mans victory slip from its grasp in the last minutes, the double-points victory that Jani, Dumas and Lieb snatched there was crucial in them becoming world champions.

They finished the season with only three podiums, all achieved in the first three races of the nine-round championship, but the results of the Webber car combined to give Porsche back-to-back manufacturer titles.

Audi’s dominance in sports prototypes until recently came from its R8, the R10 TDI, and the R15 TDI through to the R18, which now uses 46 per cent less fuel than the R10 TDI a decade ago while achieving fastest lap times.

The four-rings brand made history in 2006 by clinching its first TDI victory at Le Mans, while in 2012 the R18 e-tron quattro was the first hybrid sports car to win the French classic, regarded as the world’s greatest motor race – certainly the most important in the eyes of the motor industry.

Although withdrawing now to concentrate on the all-electric Formula E global open-wheeler series in the wake of the costly ‘Dieselgate’ scandal, Audi’s long-time motorsport chief, Dr Wolfgang Ullrich said the company was proud of its record of “pure efficiency”  in sports prototype racing.

Ullrich said safety innovations such as the tyre inflation pressure control system, the Audi Matrix LED headlights or Audi Laser Light complemented a long list of technology transfers taking place between motorsport and production in both directions.

The linking of these areas would remain vital as Audi ‘realigns’ its motorsport strategy because Formula E fitted well with the manufacturer’s decision to offer new battery-electric cars each year from 2018.

Meanwhile, the WEC technical regulations will be frozen until the end of 2019 – as a result of Audi’s pull-out – after the changes coming next year, which include aero adjustments and a power reduction to the hybrid limits imposed in this year’s Le Mans race.

The announcement was made by Vincent Beaumesnil, sporting director of the Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO), which runs Le Mans and creates the template for the WEC.

Beaumesnil said he had “absolutely no doubt” that LMP1 – the top class of Le Mans/WEC prototypes – would remain at the forefront of technology in motorsport, despite the freeze.

There had been plans for a major overhaul of regulations for 2018, which would have seen the expansion to a fifth hybrid subclass of 10 megajoules and a third permitted hybrid system.

“The technical level is already high so we have to make sure the costs are controlled, but at the same time we are working on the future,” Beaumesnil said.

“We are looking closely how we can introduce hydrogen fuel cell cars in endurance. We are looking at different kind of fuels, but I think optimisation of what we have today is still a challenge for the technical people.

“We have to keep pushing on the cost reduction and need to be attractive for new manufacturers.”

A comeback by Peugeot is tipped as the most likely next major move in the WEC and the French manufacturer is reported to have been pushing for cost containment.

Upside down winner in GT World Cup
Audi had a remarkable success elsewhere at the weekend – in the FIA GT World Cup at Macau, where Belgian driver Laurens Vanthoor was awarded the title despite his R8 LMS skidding on its roof when the race was red-flagged at less than quarter-distance.
Indeed, less than two competitive laps were completed before Vanthoor flipped.

To Vanthoor’s great surprise, he was crowned victor ahead of Frenchman Keven Estre (Porsche 991) and Germany’s defending champion Maro Engel (Mercedes-Benz AMG GT) after officials ruled the race result be decided on the penultimate lap completed.

Vanthoor emerged unscathed from the upended wreckage of his Audi after it mounted the barrier and flew backwards upside down at the high-speed Mandarin corner of the famous street circuit.

He had led the four laps of a scheduled 18-lap event – three of them behind the safety car and only one of them truly competitive.

However, New Zealander Earl Bamber, who had incurred a five-second penalty, forced his way past Vanthoor at the restart and the Belgian hit an inside kerb in pursuit, launching him into the fence and upending the R8.

By the time his car had been cleared there were just four minutes of racing time remaining and officials declared the race without a second restart.

There was found to be no rule stipulating that a driver causing a red flag should be penalised and Porsche was not expected to protest the outcome.

“Officially I have won it, but the way it happened is very strange and I don’t really know if I have deserved in a way,” Vanthoor said.

“I crashed and I have made a mistake, but I am still the winner. That is very awkward.”

Bamber was classified fourth because of his penalty.

The works Porsches and Phoenix Audis will now be shipped to Malaysia for the 12 Hours of Sepang on the second weekend of December, the final round of the inaugural Intercontinental GT Challenge that began with the Bathurst 12-Hour in February.

Vanthoor is leading the standings after Bathurst and the round at Spa in Belgium.