Earl Bamber leads the way an hour in at Fuji, for the FIA World Endurance Championship’s 6 Hours of Fuji.
The Kiwi started from pole in the #2 Cadillac V-Series.R and retained it at the start over Sebastien Buemi in the #8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid and Marco Wittmann in the #15 BMW M Hybrid V8.
Buemi and Wittmann battled for second, with the German winning, with Mike Conway in the sister #7 Toyota and Laurens Vanthoor in the #6 Porsche 963.
However, at the start of the second lap, chaos occurred at turn 1 after the track’s long straight. Robert Kubica, winner last time out in the #83 AF Corse Ferrari 499P, locked up and made contact with Fred Makowiecki in the #5 Porsche.
This sent Makowiecki into the #51 Ferrari of Antonio Giovinazzi, who then couldn’t do anything but hit the back of the #35 Alpine A424, with Ferdinand Habsburg at the wheel. This brought the safety car out.
Makowiecki came off worse, with the rear wing being knocked off the Porsche. He pitted at the end of the lap, but as this was under emergency service, he’d have to pit again when the pit lane opened under safety car.
When it did open, the two Ferraris involved in the incident, Kubica and Giovinazzi, pitted to replace damaged bodywork.
At the restart, Bamber retained the lead and now has six seconds on Wittmann. Vanbthoor soon found his way past Buemi to demote Toyota out of the top three in their home race, with Buemni and Conway now fourth and fifth. Miguel Molina in the #50 Ferrari sits sixth, with the #94 Peugeot 9X8 of Loic Duval seventh after claiming multiple positions in the turn 1 melee.
Eighth is Neel Jani in the #99 Proton Porsche 963, with ninth going to Jean-Eric Vergne in the #93 Peugeot, and Mick Schumacher in 10th in the #36 Alpine A424. The German overtook Edo Mortara in the #63 Lamborghini SC63. Mortara started ninth and ran 10th for most of the opening hour, but Schumacher put him under immense pressure and the Swiss driver has started dropping through the field and out of the top 10.
In LMGT3, Tom Van Rompuy leads in the #81 TF Sport Corvette Z06 GT3.R. He claimed the lead at the start after polesitter Francois Heriau dropped through the field, who now sits 15th in class after pitting under safety car for emergency service and then pitting again to fulfil the regulations.
Sarah Bovy is second in the #85 Iron Dames Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2. She’s just overtaken the #59 United Autosports McLaren 720S GT3 Evo of James Cottingham, who was running second, and has now chasing Van Rompuy, with a four second gap between the two.
Cottingham is third in class. His teammate Josh Caygill, in the sister #95 McLaren, was third but the two, while battling for second, made contact at turn 1 after the safety car.
Caygill came off worse and spun, dropping to the back of the field. He’s since had more problems, slowing on track, and has pulled into the pits.
