Cadillac dominate WEC Sao Paulo, Lexus claim LMGT3 victory with home-hero Barrichello on the podium
- DIVEBOMB Motorsport
- Jul 13
- 5 min read
Written by Owen Bradley and Aaron Carroll
The fifth round of the World Endurance Championship (WEC) got underway at 11:30 local time, as the 36 car grid sped down to the Senna S.
The No.12 Cadillac that was put on pole by Alex Lynn, now with Will Stevens at the wheel, got away well initially, but later on around the lap the No.5 Porsche of Julien Andlauer got to the Britons inside and took the lead.
In LMGT3 the No.10 Racing Spirit of Lemans (RSL) held the lead, with a cracking start for Darren Leung behind in the No.95 McLaren. He jumped past both Lexus cars to go from fourth to second.
The No.87 Lexus would come back again however, and eventually get the leading Aston Martin too, to take the lead of the race early on. Further down the pack, the No.27 Aston Martin was spun around by a Corvette, they re-joined at the back of the field.
The No.46 BMW, No.88 Ford and No.51 Ferrari all got five second penalties early on for start infringements.
Disaster struck for the No.15 BMW in Hypercar, a brake issue pulling them into the pit lane for an extended period. They eventually got back out but many laps down, and effectively out of contention.
The No.35 Alpine would follow them in with a Hybrid issue a handful of laps later. They lost significantly more time, as the electrical issue required much more caution from the team. The car had the Hybrid red light on, meaning it was unsafe to touch.
The car that sat in second place for much of the first hour, the No.12 Cadillac, got a drive-through penalty for a tyre pressure infringement. Stevens served the penalty, and re-emerged in fourth position.
The order remained relatively unchanged in both classes after the first set of pit stops. The No.5 Porsche was still at the top, with a sizeable gap back to the pair of Cadillacs.
The No.009 Aston Martin of Marco Sorensen however, had an impressive early stint, getting well inside the Top 10 early on, Sorensen carrying immense pace. Unfortunately, this pace wouldn't last for too long, but for a large duration of the race, they were matching the pace of the Alpine's and BMW's.
The No.85 Iron Dames Porsche began to make moves in LMGT3, getting up to fourth ahead of the No.59 McLaren. The battle for fifth overall was also heating up, the No.6 Porsche chasing the No.93 Peugeot. Laurens Vanthoor in the Penske car eventually got through.
Towards the end of the second stint, the No.38 Cadillac at the hands of Earl Bamber began to catch up to the back of the leading No.5. The two went side-by-side multiple times, with the Australian driver trying everything to get past. Eventually the two would swap positions in the pits.
Not too long afterwards, a strange Full-Course Yellow was trigged, for a kite on the track. The marshals quickly recovered the debris, and got us back to green flag racing very quickly.
There was a very tight moment for the No.50 Ferrari of Nicklas Nielsen, as he tried to get past the battling Corvettes and No.59 McLaren in LMGT3. One of the Corvettes darted out and took a chunk of bodywork off the rear of the 499P, meaning they had to come in for repairs. The AF Corse car dropped to the back of the Hypercar field.
The No.87 Lexus led LMGT3 by a large margin at this stage, but they were struck by a drive-through penalty for speeding in the pit lane. After serving the penalty they still held the lead, but the gap to the sister No.78 behind was significantly smaller.
Back at the front, the two Cadillacs led after the halfway mark pit stops, No.12 ahead of No.38. After them came the No.5 and No.6 Porsches, and then the No.94 and No.93 Peugeots in uniform.
The No.46 Team WRT BMW of Kelvin Van Der Linde, had initially ended the first lap in dead last place after going off the circuit at Turn 3, however they began an impressive road to recovery, fighting through the field to get back inside the Top 10 by the end of the first half of the race.
Meanwhile, Dani Juncadella in the No.33 Corvette was absolutely flying, fighting through the field, overtaking the No.92 Manthey Porsche and then the No.59 United Autosports McLaren before pitting.
The No.46 WRT BMW of Rossi had managed to fight back through to the Top 5, albeit on an alternate strategy which would see them need to come into the pits to make an additional stop. With fresh tyres, the No.59 United Autosports McLaren dived down the inside of Rossi into the 90 degree right-hander of Turn 10.
However, as the LMGT3 field continued to fight one another in the Top 10, a small piece of debris would see the Full Course Yellow deployed, slowing the pace down so that the drivers caught their breaths ahead of the next two hours.
The flying No.33 Corvette would then get locked into a battle with the No.95 United Autosports McLaren for a net 4th position at the time, the pair making contact at Turn 9 which sent debris onto the circuit.
Suddenly, penalties started to fly in, left, right and centre. The No.59 United Autosports McLaren was first, receiving a Drive-Through penalty for ignoring blue flags, which dropped them out of podium contention. Next would be the sister No.95 United Autosports McLaren, which received a 5 second Stop and Go Penalty. Next was the No.51 Ferrari Hypercar squad, who received a Drive-Through penalty for breaching FCY procedures.
With all of this going on, Cadillac and Lexus had continued to dominate their classes. However, Julian Andlauer in the No.5 Porsche was absolutely hunting down the No.38 Jota Cadillac of Sebastien Bourdais for second position. Unfortunately for Andlauer, the Porsche would just run out of laps to the end, the gap hovering just under and just over a single second throughout the last 30 minutes.
All eyes were on the No.10 Aston Martin in LMGT3, which had started from pole position, and was now closing down on the No.85 Iron Dames of Michelle Gatting for a final spot on the podium. Eduardo Barrichello, the son of Ex-F1 driver Rubens Barrichello, and therefore the home hero, tried several times to overtake Gatting, finally getting through in the opening sector of the circuit, sending the Brazilian fans into cheers, as Eduardo Barrichello then drove home to third place, claiming a home podium.
The No.12 Jota Cadillac would come home, driven by Norman Nato, to claim a historic and dominant victory over the rest of the field, a truly dominant display from the American manufacturer, with the No.38 Jota Cadillac coming home second.
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