[WEC] Toyota LMP1 Discussion

[chernaudi]

Makes you wonder who's scaling back to let Fernando in since it's rumored that he'll do most of the 2018/19 races, including probably both LMs depending on F1 scheduling? If Toyota will only enter two cars in every race, someone's probably getting the axe for a full season ride.

But that's only if Alonso is confirmed for most of next season's WEC races.

[Acid09]

Wasn't the word that Davidson's star at TMG was pretty much sinking this year? Although his broken-toe run in Bahrain might have helped him.

[kvenom]

Lopez seems like an obvious choice, but he still has potential

[Deleted]

Good news!

HOWEVER

I still don't understand the likely logic in downsizing to just 2 cars again, I mean the next season is going to be pretty damn cheap anyway:
A) Just five races (within calendar year)
B) No development needed really, indeed they will be running more or less the same car
C) The 3rd chassis already exists collecting dust

With their terrible history at Le Mans, do they really think they're SAFE just with two cars again? Sure, they might be faster than everybody else (even with the power boost for non-hybrids), but they've failed before with dominating cars far too many times. And even on slow-ass "cruising mode" blowouts can happen, as Porsche demonstrated this year with that huge margin to the first LMP2 before gremlins happened.

I think if Toyota lose it out this time round, it will be their biggest embarrassment yet, with "mere" privateers winning. That would probably crucify them. This is why in some ways this should be the MOST NEEDED time to have that backup car there, just in case.

IIRC this year they said that the 3rd entry was a "waste". Another strange beancounter comment. Just because it crumbled like the others doesn't mean it would've been a waste in other circumstances.

[Acid09]

Fielding three cars would probably just be seen as excessive by everyone. I mean, no disrespect to Manor, SMP et all, but they're racing a bunch of privateers.

They can keep one car in safe-safe mode and one in safe-mode and will still likely win 1-2. Running a third car and potentially locking out the privateers from the podium...it just does not look very good for the championship, imo.

I think no one is interested in them running three cars, really.

[kvenom]

Toyota could send 5 cars there and they would still find a way not to win. Next year a meteor or something with probably land on the leading car and crash it out.

[Deleted]

Originally Posted by Acid09

Fielding three cars would probably just be seen as excessive by everyone. I mean, no disrespect to Manor, SMP et all, but they're racing a bunch of privateers.

They can keep one car in safe-safe mode and one in safe-mode and will still likely win 1-2. Running a third car and potentially locking out the privateers from the podium...it just does not look very good for the championship, imo.

I think no one is interested in them running three cars, really.

Audi didn't "need" 4x R18s in 2012 either but I don't think anyone faulted them at entering them. The other two conventional powered cars were there as backup in case their preferred hybrids failed. They obviously didn't fear the Toyotas really, nor the privateers, they feared failing themselves so that was their plan B

IMO supplying bigger amount of cars to the grid harms no-one

I'm not entirely confident even safe-safe-safe mode is safe enough for Toyota Cruise modes have sunken before

[Coach Ep]

You never know.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6P2hvDCAiOU

[Acid09]

Originally Posted by Chiana

Audi didn't "need" 4x R18s in 2012 either but I don't think anyone faulted them at entering them. The other two conventional powered cars were there as backup in case their preferred hybrids failed. They obviously didn't fear the Toyotas really, nor the privateers, they feared failing themselves so that was their plan B

IMO supplying bigger amount of cars to the grid harms no-one

But they were racing factory opposition and had two different concepts at play as well, none of which applies to Toyota next year. And I remember some people saw it as excessive back when Audi did it again.

It does harm someone: The other privateers in LMP1. If Toyota fields two cars, the privateers are guaranteed to fight for at least one overall podium spot instead of potentially being locked out. Toyota will already face "racing against no proper competition" comments anyways, not sure that trying to minimize the last bit of risk will make them any friends.

I really like Toyota and I firmly believe that they painfully earned this "easy shot" at their win next year for what they've endured for the last 20 years but in all honesty, If Toyota can't close the deal racing a proven car against privateers in brand new cars then maybe it's a sign of the universe that they're not meant to win this event

[Damian Baldi]

I said it before, Toyota should put four cars on the grid, two hybrids and two non hybrids. That way they could show their technologically advanced car, and face direct competition to the non hybrid cars, showing the advantages of the hybrid system.

Same thing as Audi did in the past with the e-tron and ultra. It's a very high bet, but a fair one.

[Mike E]

Originally Posted by Damian Baldi

I said it before, Toyota should put four cars on the grid, two hybrids and two non hybrids. That way they could show their technologically advanced car, and face direct competition to the non hybrid cars, showing the advantages of the hybrid system.

Same thing as Audi did in the past with the e-tron and ultra. It's a very high bet, but a fair one.

Manufacturers are not permitted to enter non-hybrid cars.

[S griffin]

So it's interesting all this. Is Fred gonna do a full season? Who's gonna get the chop? How many are they gonna enter? This next few days should tell more

[Damian Baldi]

Originally Posted by Mike E

Manufacturers are not permitted to enter non-hybrid cars.

I know, but rules can be changed easily if they want, as they are doing to get a fictitious competition between hybrid and non hybrid cars.

[TF110]

Originally Posted by Damian Baldi

I know, but rules can be changed easily if they want, as they are doing to get a fictitious competition between hybrid and non hybrid cars.

In 2012, the Audi R18 Ultra was just as fast as the E-Tron Quattro. They can make the competition non-ficticous

I think Alonso doing a full season is unlikely with all the talk from his F1 team bosses like so http://www.racer.com/f1/item/145636-...lonso-boullier

[Deleted]

Originally Posted by Damian Baldi

I know, but rules can be changed easily if they want, as they are doing to get a fictitious competition between hybrid and non hybrid cars.

Actually, ACO implied during the late summer and fall that the rules in fact were intended to be reversed to that OEM could field nonhybrid cars, but last week there was clarification that it's not the case after all

Pity

[roderick]

Toyota can only enter 2 cars due to lack of money...(they did loose alot of funding due to this year's le mans)
Running 3 cars actually is quite expensive due to all mechanics, engineers, spare + spare spare parts for 3 cars, Testing etc
Alonso did all right for the testing but I dont think he'll be faster than Kamui at Le mans ... In LMP1 hybrid, you need experience and hybrid car technique to drive.(F1 style driving wouldnt work well at all due to their regenerative braking, fuel cuts and lifting etc)

[Deleted]

Yes but there's only five races next year, and only two of them outside Europe, plus they won't be developing the car really, so it's gonna result in big savings already

[Coach Ep]

Plus having Alonso on board for the big one (and possibly more than that) could interest some additional sponsors to (partially) cover those costs.

I would also think Toyota received a few "special treatment cards" from the ACO for saving their beloved world championship...

[Deleted]

I wonder if they could just send 1 car "to the other races" and if ACO would be fine with that. We already know partial season was what they actually wanted to do (from the reports we saw), you know Le Mans + Spa and Fuji, before ACO enforced the full season requirement for receiving LM entry

[roderick]

Originally Posted by Chiana

Yes but there's only five races next year, and only two of them outside Europe, plus they won't be developing the car really, so it's gonna result in big savings already

Yes, they wont be developing the car as much but from what I hear, They had at least 1/3 of their funding cut and they still need to money to keep their 2019-2020 season development going.
All these manufacture develop their core components a year in advance at least. Next season will be big saving season for them, which means there will be more development for 2019 season.

[TF110]

And yet Vasselon said that they had budget left over to add parts to this year's car! Which is it then? Is it they have no money? Or do we go by what we've seen from Fuji onward that they do have money and are putting it towards this year's car? That's what he said at least. There's no reason to do a brand new car for next season(s). They update this year's car a bit and work on reliability and it will do them well until the GT Prototype rules kick in over 2 years from now. Unless they fire one of their current drivers or sit one for Le Mans, Alonso will have to drive a third car. My guess is he will at Spa and Le Mans alongside a Japanese driver and maybe Sarrazin again.

[roderick]

Originally Posted by TF110

And yet Vasselon said that they had budget left over to add parts to this year's car! Which is it then? Is it they have no money? Or do we go by what we've seen from Fuji onward that they do have money and are putting it towards this year's car? That's what he said at least. There's no reason to do a brand new car for next season(s). They update this year's car a bit and work on reliability and it will do them well until the GT Prototype rules kick in over 2 years from now. Unless they fire one of their current drivers or sit one for Le Mans, Alonso will have to drive a third car. My guess is he will at Spa and Le Mans alongside a Japanese driver and maybe Sarrazin again.

budget left over are for this years' budget. As a cooperate company, they need to spend their dedicated money this year hence they did few updates a little in advance.

There is no way Toyota will bring the 3rd car for next season. I can almost say I know they can't. but let's wait and see since that's all we can do
My guess is that they are going to pick 5 regular drivers and have 2 spare drivers (Alonso and someone else) to swap around.

[chernaudi]

From SC365 so take with as much skepticism as you like, but that site's reporting that Lopez or possibly Davidson is set for demotion from a full time ride with TMG next year. Buemi is set to continue as a full time driver even though his Formula E outfit is sponsored by Nissan:

http://sportscar365.com/lemans/wec/t...river-shakeup/

Ironically, if Lopez gets the short end of the stick due to wanting to have Alonso in one of their cars for multiple races and cite performance, Toyota have to blame themselves for rushing Lopez into LMP1 with no real multi-class racing experience. And who's to say that Alonso won't have the same problems, too? I can't remember Fernando doing any road racing that wasn't single seaters.

But then again, TMG reportedly still have Nico Lapierre under contract in spite of his screw up at LM.

[Adam43]

Probably just speculation at this point, but all sounds fine to me.

[hondafan37]

Originally Posted by chernaudi

From SC365 so take with as much skepticism as you like, but that site's reporting that Lopez or possibly Davidson is set for demotion from a full time ride with TMG next year. Buemi is set to continue as a full time driver even though his Formula E outfit is sponsored by Nissan:

http://sportscar365.com/lemans/wec/t...river-shakeup/

Ironically, if Lopez gets the short end of the stick due to wanting to have Alonso in one of their cars for multiple races and cite performance, Toyota have to blame themselves for rushing Lopez into LMP1 with no real multi-class racing experience. And who's to say that Alonso won't have the same problems, too? I can't remember Fernando doing any road racing that wasn't single seaters.

But then again, TMG reportedly still have Nico Lapierre under contract in spite of his screw up at LM.

Kamui Kobayashi also had problems with the traffic the last race and he has many years of experience.