Monza WEC: Toyota fastest in opening practice
Toyota's pair of Le Mans Hypercars locked out the top two positions in opening practice for this weekend's Monza FIA World Endurance Championship round.
Jose Maria Lopez set what proved to be the fastest time of 1m38.401s early on in the one hour, 45 minute session at the wheel of the #7 Toyota GR010 Hybrid.
That was enough to edge out the sister #8 car of Brendon Hartley by 0.134s.
What was originally planned to be a 90-minute session, the WEC's first official running at the track since the 2017 Prologue pre-season test, was extended by 15 minutes owing to a red flag at the 33-minute mark, caused by the Roberto Lacorte suffering a crash in the Cetilar Racing Ferrari.
After action resumed, the Signatech-run Alpine A480-Gibson set its fastest time of 1m38.553s in the hands of Nicolas Lapierre to move up to third ahead of the two Glickenhaus 007 LMHs.
Both Glickenhaus cars were within seven tenths of the pace, with Romain Dumas setting the American marque's fastest time of 1m39.042s aboard the #709 car inside the first 10 minutes of the session - briefly going fastest overall before both Toyotas improved.
Olivier Pla set the quickest time in the #708 Glickenhaus, just four hundredths behind Dumas.
United Autosports led the way in the LMP2 class, with the returning Filipe Albuquerque - absent from the previous round at Portimao owing to an IMSA clash - going fastest on a 1m39.373s in the team's #22 Oreca 07-Gibson.
That was a little under half a second up on the time set by Nyck de Vries for Racing Team Nederland, which has lost two of its regular drivers, Job van Uitert and Giedo van der Garde, for this weekend due to positive COVID-19 tests.
Ben Hanley put DragonSpeed third-fastest, another two tenths back, ahead of the fourth-placed WRT car and the two JOTA entries.
Risi Competizione was 10th-fastest in its first session running its new Oreca, with Oliver Jarvis setting the team's best time of 1m40.996s to go 10th-fastest in the 12-car class.
Ferrari led the way in GTE Pro as its two AF Corse-run factory entries beat the two works Porsches.
Miguel Molina led in the #52 Ferrari 488 GTE Evo on a 1m46.329s, nearly four tenths up on the #51 entry of James Calado, while Neel Jani was third-fastest in the #92 Porsche 911 RSR-19.
Porsche did however set the pace in GTE Am thanks to a last-ditch effort of 1m47.194s by Riccardo Pera in the #56 Project 1 car, knocking ex-Formula 1 driver Giancarlo Fisichella in the #54 AF Corse Ferrari off the top of the times.
Watch Sunday's WEC action from Monza unfold on motorsport.tv – click here.
Session results:
| Cla | # | Drivers | Car | Class | Time | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 7 |  Mike Conway  Kamui Kobayashi  Jose Maria Lopez |
Toyota GR010 - Hybrid | HYPERCAR | 1'38.401 | |
| 2 | 8 |  Sébastien Buemi Kazuki Nakajima  Brendon Hartley |
Toyota GR010 - Hybrid | HYPERCAR | 1'38.535 | 0.134 |
| 3 | 36 |  Andre Negrao  Nicolas Lapierre Matthieu Vaxiviere |
Alpine A480 | HYPERCAR | 1'38.553 | 0.152 |
| 4 | 709 | Romain Dumas Franck Mailleux Richard Westbrook |
Glickenhaus 007 LMH | HYPERCAR | 1'39.042 | 0.641 |
| 5 | 708 | Pipo Derani  Gustavo Menezes Olivier Pla |
Glickenhaus 007 LMH | HYPERCAR | 1'39.085 | 0.684 |
| 6 | 22 | Philip Hanson Fabio Scherer  Filipe Albuquerque |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'39.373 | 0.972 |
| 7 | 29 |  Frits van Eerd Paul-Loup Chatin Nyck de Vries |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'39.837 | 1.436 |
| 8 | 21 |  Henrik Hedman  Juan Pablo Montoya Ben Hanley |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'40.075 | 1.674 |
| 9 | 31 | Robin Frijns  Ferdinand Habsburg Charles Milesi |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'40.101 | 1.700 |
| 10 | 28 |  Sean Gelael  Stoffel Vandoorne Tom Blomqvist |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'40.148 | 1.747 |
| 11 | 70 | Esteban Garcia Loic Duval Norman Nato |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'40.277 | 1.876 |
| 12 | 38 |  Roberto Gonzalez Antonio Felix da Costa Anthony Davidson |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'40.400 | 1.999 |
| 13 | 34 |  Jakub Smiechowski Renger van der Zande Alex Brundle |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'40.669 | 2.268 |
| 14 | 1 | Tatiana Calderon  Sophia Flörsch |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'40.911 | 2.510 |
| 15 | 82 |  Ryan Cullen Oliver Jarvis Felipe Nasr |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'40.996 | 2.595 |
| 16 | 20 |  Jan Magnussen Anders Fjordbach Dennis Andersen |
Oreca 07 | LMP2 | 1'41.093 | 2.692 |
| 17 | 44 |  Miro Konopka Oliver Webb Matej Konopka |
Ligier JSP 217 | LMP2 | 1'43.191 | 4.790 |
| 18 | 52 | Daniel Serra  Miguel Molina |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE PRO | 1'46.329 | 7.928 |
| 19 | 51 |  Alessandro Pier Guidi James Calado |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE PRO | 1'46.700 | 8.299 |
| 20 | 92 | Kevin Estre Neel Jani |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | LMGTE PRO | 1'46.895 | 8.494 |
| 21 | 91 | Gianmaria Bruni Richard Lietz |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | LMGTE PRO | 1'46.983 | 8.582 |
| 22 | 56 |  Egidio Perfetti Matteo Cairoli Riccardo Pera |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | LMGTE AM | 1'47.194 | 8.793 |
| 23 | 54 | Thomas Flohr Francesco Castellacci Giancarlo Fisichella |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE AM | 1'47.388 | 8.987 |
| 24 | 60 | Claudio Schiavoni Andrea Piccini Matteo Cressoni |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE AM | 1'47.479 | 9.078 |
| 25 | 777 | Satoshi Hoshino Tomonobu Fujii Andrew Watson |
Aston Martin Vantage AMR | LMGTE AM | 1'47.599 | 9.198 |
| 26 | 83 | François Perrodo Nicklas Nielsen Alessio Rovera |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE AM | 1'47.640 | 9.239 |
| 27 | 71 | Brendan Iribe Ollie Millroy Ben Barnicoat |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE AM | 1'47.700 | 9.299 |
| 28 | 33 | Ben Keating Dylan Pereira Felipe Fraga |
Aston Martin Vantage AMR | LMGTE AM | 1'47.754 | 9.353 |
| 29 | 88 | Andrew Haryanto Marco Seefried Alessio Picariello |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | LMGTE AM | 1'47.962 | 9.561 |
| 30 | 77 | Christian Ried  Jaxon Evans Matt Campbell |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | LMGTE AM | 1'47.985 | 9.584 |
| 31 | 85 | Rahel Frey Michelle Gatting Sarah Bovy |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE AM | 1'48.048 | 9.647 |
| 32 | 98 |  Paul Dalla Lana Augusto Farfus Marcos Gomes |
Aston Martin Vantage AMR | LMGTE AM | 1'48.238 | 9.837 |
| 33 | 47 | Roberto Lacorte Giorgio Sernagiotto Antonio Fuoco |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE AM | 1'48.310 | 9.909 |
| 34 | 388 | Pierre Ehret Christian Hook Jeroen Bleekemolen |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE AM | 1'48.665 | 10.264 |
| 35 | 86 | Michael Wainwright Benjamin Barker Tom Gamble |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | LMGTE AM | 1'48.700 | 10.299 |
| 36 | 61 | Christoph Ulrich Simon Mann  Toni Vilander |
Ferrari 488 GTE EVO | LMGTE AM | 1'48.834 | 10.433 |
| 37 | 46 | Dennis Olsen Anders Buchardt Maxwell Root |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | LMGTE AM | 1'49.682 | 11.281 |
| View full results | ||||||
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