No.36 leads Alpine 1-2 in the 6 Hours of Fuji with 3 hours to go
With 3 hours remaining on the clock, the pole sitting No.35 Alpine is currently leading the 6 Hours of Fuji, with the sister car, the No.36, behind in second, but losing time for reasons unknown. The No.007 Aston Martin is running in third, some ten seconds back.
In LMGT3, the No.32 BMW leads the race from the No.78 Lexus and the No.77 Ford, but all three are yet to pit, and the No.33 Corvette and the No.10 McLaren are expected to cycle back to the lead after their pit stops.
The track has been declared wet, but the contenders still remain on slicks, although more rain is expected to hit the track.
As it happened
With the track damp, a clean start was crucial, and the No.36 Alpine, starting from pole, had a good start to maintain its lead. The No.35 Alpine followed closely in second, and the No.19 Genesis maintained third.
The other Genesis, the No.17, however, was dropping down the order as Andre Lotterer opted to be cautious on the start, dropping from fifth to eighth. Title contenders, No.8 Toyota with a rapid Sébastien Buemi, gained two places, up to sixth at the start.
The No.12 also had a good start, climbing up to seventh, but the sister car, the No.38, dropped from seventh to tenth.
But before the first lap was even finished, the Safety Car was brought out following a series of incidents in LMGT3.
Heading into turn one, François Heriau in the No.21 AF Corse Ferrari hit the No.61 Mercedes, triggering a chain reaction that ultimately resulted in the No.87 Lexus and the No.34 Corvette facing the wrong way. The No.61 was forced to retire due to a damaged chassis caused by the incident.
The No.92 Manthey Porsche hit the wall, but managed to get going; the safety car was brought out due to debris on track.
In LMGT3, the No.58 Garage 59 McLaren started developing a major class lead with Finn Gehrsitz, the only silver rated driver on track, as opposed to the other teams running their bronze rated drivers for the start.
The No.7 was the first to pit, just 24 minutes into the race, changing the left side tyres after a slow puncture on the front left, committing to an offset strategy in the process.
Three minutes before the end of the first hour, the first Full Course Yellow was called due to debris on the exit of turn three.
The race leaders, the No.36 Alpine, were the first to enter the pit lane for their routine pit stops, Jules Gounon stepping out of the car and Victor Martins jumping in.
Following the leaders into the pits were the No.007 Aston Martin and the No.17 Genesis. The No.007 saved time by changing only two tyres, putting them ahead of the No.36 exiting pit lane. All three cars were behind the No.7 Toyota which made its pit stop 35 minutes earlier.
The No.35 Alpine chose not to change tyres, jumping the No.7 Toyota and the sister car, the No.36.
After the first pit stop cycle, the No.35 was in the lead, less than a car length behind was the No.7, with the No.36 not too far behind.
Nyck de Vries in the No.7 attempted an overtake on the leading Alpine, but clipped the rear right of the race leader and spun around, dropping to fifth.
Meanwhile, the No.93 Peugeot clipped the front left of the No.23 Aston Martin while lapping it, unsettling the LMGT3 car and sending it into the barriers. The incident brought out the Virtual Safety Car.
The No.36 Alpine, the No.7 Toyota, the No.009 Aston Martin, the No.19 Genesis and both Cadillacs all entered the pits to take advantage of the VSC.
In LMGT3, the No.91 Manthey Porsche took advantage to jump up to second in class behind the No.58 Garage 59 McLaren.
As the Hypercars kept pitting towards the end of the VSC, the No.36 cycled back to the lead with the No.007 in second and the No.35 in third. The VSC soon transitioned into a Safety Car, bunching the field up behind Martins in the No.36.
With four and a half hours to go, the race went green again, with everyone getting away cleanly.
In LMGT3, the No.91 Porsche took the class lead from the No.58 McLaren with the No.77 Ford Mustang following closely.
A lap later, the No.35 Alpine returned to running in second after passing the No.007 Aston Martin on the main straight.
Closing in on the two hour mark, the championship leading No.20 BMW with René Rast clipped the No.51 Ferrari, getting a puncture and damaging its rear bodywork. The No.20 was forced to pit and exited the pits with Sheldon van der Linde in the car and the rear bodywork not properly clipped on the rear right side.
Two minutes ahead of the two hour mark, the No.93 Peugeot stopped on track after turn one with a broken gearbox. A little more than a minute later, the car managed to get going again on electrical power and retired in the pits.
A Full Course Yellow was declared with exactly four hours left to clear out debris put on pit entry by the damaged No.20 BMW.
Twenty minutes later, the No.007 Aston Martin made an early pit stop as the No.009 kept closing on the sister car.
A couple of laps later, the Hypercars started filtering in for their scheduled pit stops, with the No.009, No.17 and the No.8 coming in from the major points paying positions.
The No.8 Toyota short fuelled, and thanks to Brendon Hartley's quick tyre warmup, they sliced past the No.009 Aston Martin.
Following the third pit stop cycle, the Alpines led the race 1-2, the No.36 ahead of the No.35. The No.007 ran third ahead of the No.8 Toyota, who in turn was followed very closely by the No.009 Aston Martin.
In LMGT3, the No.58's strategy of having their silver driver, Gehrsitz, start the car was starting to bite them back after switching to their bronze rated driver, Alexander West, as they started losing positions left, right and centre, dropping from second to twelfth.
Meanwhile, light showers started hitting the track, but not enough to have any meaningful consequences.
Soon after, the No.8 Toyota was passed by the No.009 into the final chicane.
With ten minutes to the halfway mark, another FCY was called to clear up some debris before going back to green a couple of minutes later.
Soon after the FCY, the track was declared wet, but still not severe enough for the teams to stray away from the slicks.
Just by the halfway mark, the No.35 Alpine passed the race leading No.36 on the main straight as the pole sitter started going slow for reasons unknown.
With half the race completed, the No.35 leads an Alpine 1-2 at the moment with the Aston Martins running 3-4, the No.007 leading the pair.
In LMGT3, the No.32 BMW leads from the No.78 Lexus and the No.77 Ford, but they are yet to pit.
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