Three weeks ago, the team enjoyed a winning debut for its TR010 HYBRID at Imola to take the early lead in both the manufacturers\u2019 and drivers\u2019 World Championships. S\u00e9bastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley and Ry\u014d Hirakawa won in Italy in their #8 TR010 HYBRID, while the sister #7 car of Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Nyck de Vries made it a double podium with third place.<\/p>\n
The team takes that momentum into the second of eight rounds this season, at Spa, which is a favourite for many drivers and fans. It winds through the Ardennes forest on a 7.004 km layout consisting of fast, undulating sectors at the beginning and end, separated by a tighter, more technical sector two.<\/p>\n
As well as being a final competitive opportunity to optimise team operations prior to the Le Mans 24 Hours on 13-14 June, the Spa event also helps engineers and drivers to prepare the TR010 HYBRIDs. High-speed corners like Eau Rouge-Raidillon, Pouhon and Blanchimont, as well as the long flat-out Kemmel Straight, require car set-ups similar to the Circuit de la Sarthe.<\/p>\n
Spa is one of TOYOTA RACING\u2019s two home races in WEC, alongside Fuji Speedway, and the team has a strong record there. In its 13 races in Belgium, it has achieved four pole positions, eight wins and a total of 14 podiums.<\/p>\n
Cheering on the team\u2019s bid to add to those successes will be a large contingent of employees from TOYOTA RACING GmbH, the team\u2019s operational base just 120km away in Cologne. Colleagues from Toyota Motor Europe in Brussels, Toyota\u2019s European headquarters, will also add their support.<\/p>\n
In addition to the current generation of Hypercars, the latest engine technology will be showcased at Spa as well. A hydrogen-engined GR Yaris – which has all the sound and sensations of a combustion engine with near-zero tailpipe emissions – will complete parade laps of the legendary Spa circuit on Saturday lunchtime, shortly before the 2pm race start.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Quotes:<\/p>\n
Kamui Kobayashi (Team Principal and driver, car #7): \u201cWe made a great start to the season in Imola thanks to a big effort from the whole team. Now we want to keep this momentum going throughout the season, and Spa is another important race for us. As well as being one of our home races, it is a big step in our Le Mans preparations. The TR010 HYBRID looked strong in Imola which gives us encouragement, but we need to push hard again to get the maximum performance at Spa.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mike Conway (Driver, car #7): \u201cI love racing at Spa, it\u2019s one of the highlights of the WEC season. In the past, we\u2019ve gone well there and, considering we made such a positive start to the season at Imola, I\u2019m optimistic we can fight at the front again. But we saw at Imola how close the Hypercar field is, so we can\u2019t afford to make any mistakes or leave any performance on the table.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nyck de Vries (Driver, car #7): \u201cI\u2019m excited to race again at Spa, particularly because it\u2019s one of the home races for the team and for me personally, as it\u2019s the closest to where I\u2019m from the Netherlands. There\u2019s always a big crowd at Spa and a special atmosphere, so I\u2019m expecting another great event. Hopefully we can put on a fantastic show for all our fans.\u201d<\/p>\n
S\u00e9bastien Buemi (Driver, car #8): \u201cSpa is a really special circuit, great fun to drive and very challenging. It\u2019s such a historic place, all the legends of our sport have raced there and there are so many memories, including a lot of wins for our team. It still puts a smile on my face to drive a Hypercar flat-out around there, and I can\u2019t wait to get started.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brendon Hartley (Driver, car #8): \u201cI think for almost every driver, Spa is one of the most challenging and rewarding circuits. It\u2019s an old-school circuit, with undulations and some fast corners. You need to be precise and committed; it\u2019s a real drivers\u2019 track. Our season started really well with victory on the TR010 HYBRID\u2019s debut. We\u2019ll be pushing to keep that form going at Spa and then into Le Mans.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ry\u014d Hirakawa (Driver, car #8): \u201cWe couldn\u2019t have asked for a better start to the season and now we are hungry to win more races. Spa is a really fun circuit to drive and I enjoy racing there. But it\u2019s tricky for the set-up of the car, because you have to compromise between top speed on the fast parts and downforce in sector two. This is similar to Le Mans, so it\u2019s a good preparation for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
‘;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Three weeks ago, the team enjoyed a winning debut for its TR010 HYBRID at Imola to take the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13987,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[7,9527,144,9528,484],"class_list":["post-13986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-belgium","tag-belgium","tag-motorsports-wec","tag-news","tag-tgr","tag-toyota-europe"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116516039268648940","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}