Quite simply, the Toyotas had the pace to win… although BoP showed the Glickenhaus 007 and Alpine were closer on overall lap times compared to 2021, they were not in the hunt over a race stint
Toyota scored its fifth successive win at the 90th edition of the Le Mans 24 hours, with Brendon Hartley, Sebastien Buemi and Rio Hirakawa taking the victory ahead of their team mates, Mike Conway, Jose Maria Lopez and Kamui Kobayashi.
Glickenhaus, meanwhile, saw its two cars come home third and fourth, with Ryan Briscoe, Richard Westbrook and Franck Mailleux taking the final spot on the podium after a relatively trouble-free race.
Unsurprisingly, Balance of Performance was a hot topic ahead of the race, with Alpine penalised after qualifying within four tenths of the Toyotas after Thursday’s Hyperpole session. As one observer put it, ‘If ever you want an illustration of a Balance of Performance that doesn’t work, this is it.’
Even if it had stayed reliable, there was no way the Alpine, winner at Sebring in March, could compete on pace.
In GTE Pro, BoP arguments raged behind the scenes, with at least one manufacturer threatening to end programmes completely unless cheating was exposed. This was a consequence of running the race outside the normal, automatically-generated Balance of Performance that governs the rest of the FIA WEC season, due to the nature of the circuit and length of the race. Eventually, it was resolved, but the rumblings about performance balancing will undoubtedly reach even noisier levels in the months to come as LMH and LMDh prepare to do battle in France in
