At the WEC Silverstone Six Hours, Porsche capitalized on Audi’s disqualification and became the overall winner. No. 7 Audi R18 of Andre Lotterer, Benoit Treluyer and Marcel Fassler were supposed to win the race but committed a technical infraction after crossing the line, resulting to Porsche inheriting the victory.
Reportedly, Audi’s front skid block was below the 20mm minimum, as provided by article 3.5.6 a3 of the LMP1 Technical Regulations. The violation was discovered after Audi finished first in the Sunday race, resulting to Audi’s disqualification.
Audi Sport Team Joest was already celebrating their win, which was supposed to be their fourth Silverstone Six Hours in five years. However, they were excluded from the result immediately after the race upon the discovery of the front skid block thickness.
Fox Sports says that the Porsche 919 Hybrid of Romain Dumas, Marc Lieb and Neel Jani, which finished second, was the rightful victor. The Toyota TS050 Hybrid of Stephane Sarrazin, Kamui Kobayashi and Mike Conway was also given the No. 2. spot. Rebellion Racing of Alexandre Imperatori, Matteo Tuscher and Dominik Kraihamer was elevated to third place.
In the meantime, Audi has appealed the finding, so the results will remain temporary until a hearing is conducted by a sports tribunal.
The Independent notes that during the first half of the race, Porsche appeared to be poised to win. Webber passed the No. 8 Audi of Oliver Jarvis just after the beginning of the race.
On lap 17, he overtook Lotterer to take the lead and created a considerable gap when he passed the vehicle to Hartley. Although Hartley initially managed to extend the lead to over 40 seconds, an overtaking error caused the New Zealander to slide along the track and stop at Village. The No. 8 Audi driven by Lucas Di Grassi was also forced to stop on the same lap as Hartley’s Porsche due to a hybrid failure.
The Audi and Porsche raced to the finish line and the former ultimately finished 47 seconds ahead, according to The Guardian. Toyota had a decent finish but are expected to make more improvements if they wish to gain an advantage over the other two teams. Currently, Porsche appears to have the advantage in terms of specs, although the team will have to review technical regulations.
The next race will happen at Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium from May 5 to 7, 2016. More updates and details on the Audi disqualification hearing are expected soon.
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