Toyota’s 6 Hours of Imola-winning drivers, Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Nyck de Vries, told media directly after the race that Toyota couldn’t have done much more, on their way to a somewhat surprise win.
“It was really tough conditions and the fuel save was massive,” said Conway. So, really good by the guys, they executed the strategy, I don’t think it could have been much better. It was pretty hard with the conditions, to read what was going to happen with the rain and so.
So yeah, I think we couldn’t have done much more, so big congrats to the guys and stellar job,” finished the Brit.
De Vries, who took his first WEC win, spoke about his decisive move to take the lead from Ferrari’s Miguel Molina half way through the race.
“I was happy with my my stint. Obviously overtaking here is very challenging, it’s very narrow and I felt like I couldn’t really find an opportunity through making a move on car 51 [Molina’s car] but on the full course yellow restart I was awake and managed to have him.
“But then quite shortly after was another virtual safety car, followed by the pit stop.
“But yeah, I think we are very happy. Great to be back on the top step, since little while — I think my last win was Berlin Formula E 2022. So it’s been a bit of a while, so it’s nice to be back and sharing that with my teammates, because I think everyone really deserves it after the job they did.
Kobayashi, meanwhile, was the last driver in the car, contending with the very tricky conditions caused by the rain, and pressure from the #6 Porsche of Kevin Estre behind him.
“I had a big question myself because, once I jump, it started raining,” the Japanese veteran driver said.
“On the slick tire and then you swap to the wet tire and I had to check because last time I was in the lead. I think we did the right call. We changed to the wet tyre and we maintained the gap.
“And obviously, I think Ferrari was staying on the slick tyre. Obviously, that was, I think, a wrong decision for them. And we got a chance to maintain the gap and then, I think we kept good pace on the wet tyre, but obviously, I think the track going to the slick tyres again, it was very hard to judge which moment we needed the slick tyre.
“So, we need to decide. At the end of the day I think we changed one car to slick. It was very challenging for myself, being on the track. But yeah, I think we did manage to stay on the track.”
Kobayashi then went on to speak about his fuel saving, in order to make it to the end without stopping for a short fuel stop.
Unfortunately, I think we were not sure if we can remain fuel until the end. So maybe we are talking about we need to splash in the end or not.
“We realised that we need save fuel massively, so we start saving fuel at same time. I think car #6 [Porsche], Kevin [Estre] was catching me up pretty quick and I need to survive with energy saving myself while he went flat out I think. A very tough job but I think to finish on top, that’s great,” he concluded.
