The 2020 8 Hours of Bahrain will both mark the final race of the 2019/20 FIA World Endurance Championship, as well as the the final round where LMP1 will be the top class of the global endurance series.
That means that it will also be the last time that we will see Toyota’s dominant TS050 Hybrid in action. After the flag drops in Bahrain on Saturday night, it will be an end of an era as the WEC transitions to the Le Mans Hypercar category for 2021.
Toyota has already been public about the development of the new car, showing several teaser images earlier in the week. Additionally, since the beginning of the 2019/20 season at Silverstone in September 2019, it has been referring to the final season of its LMP1 car as the ‘TS050 Farewell Tour’.
There’s little doubt that the TS050 Hybrid will go down in endurance racing history as one of the most dominant and successful prototypes to ever race in both the championship and Le Mans.
With two championship doubles, three Le Mans victories, a slew of championship wins and an all-time lap record at Circuit de la Sarthe, the last two seasons have been tremendously successful for Toyota.
As history would have it, however, Toyota bowing out with its LMP1 challenger in Bahrain is not a unique occasion. In fact, it’s happened twice before, and both times it included one of Toyota’s biggest rivals.
Thanks to Bahrain’s frequent placement as season finale, prior to the arrival of the Super Season-style calendar that was introduced for the 2018/19 season and largely carried over into the 2019/20, it has played host to the final LMP1 races for both Audi and Porsche.
Audi’s departure was arguably the most significant of the two. Since the turn of the millenium, it had been the biggest force in endurance racing.
Apart from wins by Bentley and Peugeot, it had taken on an unbelievable undefeated streak at Le Mans that lasted from its first win with the R8 in 2000 all the way to Porsche finally snapping the streak with a famous win for Nico Hülkenberg in 2015.
Since the late noughties, Audi had pinned the emphasis of its LMP1 program on diesel engines. Its first diesel car, the R10, was introduced in 2006 and won Le Mans three times in a row before Peugeot’s own diesel 908 snapped a five-race winning streak for the German giants. After that, it would continue winning with the R15 and R18.
Audi went into 2016 with an entirely new look for the R18. Gone was the clinical white and red look that had adorned the car for a number of years, and in came a new, menacing black-and-red look, resembling something the Empire might have used in Star Wars. It had updated aerodynamics and a new KERS system. At the heart of it, however, was still the diesel powerplant that had proven so successful in years prior.
The car was a real force to be reckoned with, winning second time out in Spa-Francorchamps after a disqualification at the season opener. The updated R18 was looking like a real contender. And then came dieselgate.
The Volkswagen emissions scandal, more commonly referred to as ‘Dieselgate’, was an absolutely giant automotive scandal, the effects of which are still being felt to this day. The very brief explanation of it was that the Volkswagen Group had used software in diesel cars that controlled the emissions during testing to meet testing standards, which meant that its cars were emitting far greater admissions during real-world driving than the tests had showed.
With Volkswagen’s diesel cars suddenly under greater scrutiny than ever before, its subsidiary Audi racing diesel prototypes in the World Endurance Championship became something of a problem and thus, the plug was pulled on the Audi Sport LMP1 program during the 2016 season.
The final round of that season was the 2016 6 Hours of Bahrain. Audi entered a pair of R18s, both displaying a farewell message on the tail fin. During what was an emotional weekend, the German giants bowed out of the championship in the only way they knew how: winning.
After taking pole position, the #8 Audi R18 of Loic Duval, Lucas di Grassi and Oliver Jarvis led an Audi one-two, with Andre Lotterer, Marcel Fässler and Benoit Treluyer in second place.
After Audi left in the wake of the emissions scandal, it left just Porsche and Toyota competing in the top class of the championship for 2017.
Despite a smaller field, it still provided fans with some spectacular racing, including a tremendous battle between the two manufacturers at Circuit of the Americas, with Jose Maria Lopez battling Andre Lotterer. It’s worth seeking out when you get the chance, as it is prototype racing at its very best.
Unfortunately for WEC, the LMP1 exodus continued during that year. After Audi, Porsche too pulled the plug on the LMP1 program, to instead focus its attention on Formula E, paired with a greater focus on GT racing, where it has been very successful since.
Like in 2016, the 6 Hours of Bahrain once again formed the final round of the season, and so, like in 2016, it was another farewell party.
This time, the party bowing out did not win, as Toyota grabbed the final win of the season, but Porsche did earn the distinction of exiting as world champions, something Audi had not been able to do.
While Porsche hasn’t been seen in prototype racing since, it has been very active in the WEC and IMSA with its GTE programme, winning championships in both. History shows that it hadn’t been the first time that the German manufacturer closed the book on a prototype programme, but history also shows that it has often returned.
History might actually be on the brink of repeating itself on that front, with Porsche already publicly stating that it is evaluating building a car for the LMDh regulations, which are set to come in during 2022 and 2023.
While that is something for the future, one thing is for certain: with Toyota (and LMP1) bowing out on Saturday, a new chapter in endurance racing is ready to replace it.
