"Two great cars" and "two best drivers": The recipe behind TF Sport's LMGT3 championship win at Portimão
- Ghazlan Atqiya Firmansyah
- Oct 19
- 3 min read
The newly crowned LMGT3 champions, the No.82 TF Sport crew, delivered a strong drive during Saturday's 4 Hours of Portimão race. The Corvette squad had to defend its lead from the charging No.23 McLaren in the closing stages.
The No.82 car enjoyed a good start to the race, with Japanese driver Hiroshi Koizumi opening the stint from the front. The 56-year-old veteran had taken the car to pole position the previous day.
Koizumi was briefly overtaken by the No.59 car before he regained the class lead. He held on to his lead during the first round of pit stops, which took place under the caution period prompted by the retirement of the No.30 Duqueine LMP3 car.
Co-driver Rui Andrade then took over the Corvette, continuing to extend the lead before handing over to Charlie Eastwood, who would take the car to the finish. But the end of the race proved to be eventful for the Irishman.
Eastwood spent the closing stages of the race fending off advances from Wayne Boyd in the No.23 United Autosports McLaren. Boyd came agonizingly close at times, but Eastwood kept his head down to win the race less than 0.5 seconds ahead of him.
After years competing with the Aston Martin Vantage, TF Sport finally secured their first LMGT3 championship with the new Corvette, crucially securing the invitation to compete in next year's 24 Hours of Le Mans.
After the race, Koizumi praised the team for providing a great car and two excellent co-drivers, calling that combination the key to their championship victory.
"The team have created a great car and I have two best drivers," He said. "That's why I was able to put the car in first place, I'm very happy about it."
He felt great once he learned the championship was theirs, but he attributed the success to a great team effort from the drivers and the crew members on the pit wall.
Andrade could not ask for a better position to take over from Koizumi. He claimed that his co-driver's qualifying pace hinted at his true performance in the race. As for his stint, the 26-year-old had an issue with the rear-view camera that made it difficult to monitor traffic.
"Obviously, we were jumped by some cars that were in an offset strategy.
"So, I had to use the new tyres that the team gave me and make my way through, then try to build a gap as much as I could. But it was a relatively easy run for me after that, not much going on.
"[I] just had an issue with the rear view camera and the mirrors, so I couldn't really see behind, which was quite stressful. But the team guided me through that very well, and then I was able to give the car to Charlie in P1."
The Angolan then added that this title felt more special compared to his 2021 LMP2 Pro-Am title. It was more special due to the high level of competition and the challenge of developing the new Corvette to match their LMGT3 peers.
Eastwood's job was arguably the hardest as he needed to keep Boyd at bay. He recalled the pace was not that great in the closing stages and mentioned how stressful it was to keep the McLaren behind.
The 30-year-old felt certain that he could not win the race if his co-drivers did not create a considerable gap during their stints. He felt super pleased to win the LMGT3 championship with Corvette.
"What a job from both of these guys [Koizumi and Andrade].
"If I didn't have the gap that I had when I got in the car, for sure, we don't win the race. So all credit to both of them for putting on two of their best stints of the year when we exactly need it.
[I'm] super pleased for the first ELMS championship for Corvette and being part of the championship myself for Corvette. We've got Bahrain in a couple of weeks as the underdogs, as we were today. Hopefully, we can have a very good month."
Andrade and Eastwood would return to action with TF Sport for the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) season finale, the 8 Hours of Bahrain in November. They recently won the 6 Hours of Fuji and currently sit third in the championship.
