"Hard to say where we are": Kobayashi on Toyota’s pace during Lone Star Le Mans practice
- Ghazlan Atqiya Firmansyah
- Sep 6
- 4 min read
The FIA World Endurance Championship resumed with yesterday's free practice sessions for the Lone Star Le Mans at Circuit of the Americas (COTA). During the incident-filled sessions, Toyota Gazoo Racing remained in the dark over the overall pace of its GR010 Hybrid.
Red flags and disruptions in Toyota's practice sessions
The first free practice session was held under the sunny Texan skies with a temperature of 38°C, and track temperatures peaked at 53°C. José María López from LMGT3 side ASP Lexus returned to the No. 7 cockpit, replacing the injured Mike Conway.
The start of the session was delayed by 50 minutes due to technical issues at race control, which resulted in the session being extended by nearly an hour. But then, No.15 BMW's Raffaele Marciello stopped on track with a suspected Motor Generator Unit (MGU) issue.
Further disruption was caused by the No.12 Cadillac and the No.20 BMW, costing Toyota and the others 20 minutes of track time. The No.8 and the No.7 car finished the session in 11th and 12th, respectively. Despite the interruptions, the team made the most of the given time to progress with its program of mechanical and aerodynamic adjustments.
The second free practice session was delayed by 30 minutes. The hot conditions in the session prompted Toyota to prioritise performance analysis and the reliability of the GR010 Hybrid and other equipment. The session prematurely ended after the No.81 TF Sport stopped on track at Turn 12. The No.7 car finished ninth with the No.8 car in distant 17th.
Key reactions after practice
No.7
Kamui Kobayashi said the team was still figuring out the full extent of its Hypercar's overall pace. He was part of the crew with Conway and Nyck de Vries, who finished second here last year, but admitted that the track felt different compared to last year.
"It’s hard to say where we are in terms of our overall pace.
"It was nice to be back here in Austin. The track seems to be a little bit different to last year because it feels less bumpy, so we have been adjusting the car set-up accordingly.
"We still need to find some more pace. We’ll work hard on that tonight, and I am sure we can improve for qualifying and the race."
López, who deputised for Conway, felt he had a good session readjusting to the rhythm of the car. The Argentine driver backed the team to find ways to extract more from the car in the upcoming sessions.
"It was a good day.
"I did a decent number of laps to help me get back into the rhythm with this car, even though there isn’t a huge amount of time for each driver in these sessions.
"I’m happy overall and pleased with the feeling I have in the car. We are on the back foot a bit in terms of lap times, so we need to work on finding some more performance."
De Vries said: "It’s always hard to know what everyone is doing in practice.
"But I had fun out there because I really enjoy driving on this track. We were obviously trying different things on each side of the garage to help us learn as much as possible. We will analyse everything tonight and hopefully put things together to make some steps forward."
No.8
Sébastien Buemi returned to the No.8 cockpit after missing the previous race in favour of Formula E. The Swiss driver felt happy to be back in the car and stated that they had been focusing more on the tyres and the car set-up.
"I am happy to be back in the car after missing Brazil.
"It’s been a hot day as expected, and we have been trying to learn as much as possible about the tyres and the set-up.
"Now we have some good data to analyse and I hope we can find some pace. Some competitors are a bit faster than us at the moment, so we will try to improve the car for the race."
Ryō Hirakawa said: "It was a productive day.
"We improved the car quite a lot from the beginning, especially on the long runs. We have some room to improve in qualifying trim, but in terms of race pace, we looked better.
"We are not at the top of the timing sheets, but I think it was a solid start, and now we want to do more tomorrow. We need to find an extra bit of performance."
Brendon Hartley said the team was not as competitive as they would have hoped. The New Zealander admitted that there was still plenty of work to do to catch their rivals.
"We had no dramas, just a lot of red flags, but that is the same for everyone.
"It was fun to be back on track after the summer break, and nice to be here in Austin again. We were not as competitive as we would have liked today, particularly on one lap. So, there is still a lot of work to do before the race if we are going to fight at the front."
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