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Austin WEC: Webber/Bernhard/Hartley win for Porsche despite penalty

Porsche drivers Mark Webber, Timo Bernhard and Brendon Hartley came back from a one-minute stop-go penalty at Austin to claim a second consecutive World Endurance Championship victory

Their Porsche 919 Hybrid had the edge over their sister car during the first half of the six-hour race and was over a half a minute clear when Webber overshot his pit.

The resulting delay reduced the lead to approximately 10 seconds, which Bernhard extended to 13s when the car was given a one-minute stop-go for its pitlane misdemeanour.

That handed the initiative to the second Porsche shared by Neel Jani, Marc Lieb and Romain Dumas, which looked set to take the victory until an electronic issue with 35 minutes to go.

It was able to return to the track for one final lap and was classified down in 12th position.

The problems for the Porsche allowed the Audi R18 e-tron quattro of championship leaders Andre Lotterer, Benoit Treluyer and Marcel Fassler to take second position.

They had trailed the other Audi, shared by Lucas di Grassi, Oliver Jarvis and Loic Duval, which was also hit with a stop-go for a pitlane infringement.

Lotterer was then able to overtake di Grassi in the closing stages to seal the runner-up spot, albeit more than a minute down on the winner.

The #1 Toyota TS040 HYBRID of Sebastien Buemi, Anthony Davidson and Kazuki Nakajima was two laps down in fourth place on another day on which the Japanese manufacturer couldn't challenge the German marques.

The sister car was crashed out by Mike Conway late in the third hour.

G-Drive Racing took LMP2 honours with the OAK-run Ligier-Nissan JSP2 of Sam Bird, Julien Canal and Roman Rusinov.

It had come out on top in a battle with the KCMG ORECA-Nissan 05 and was on course for victory even before the chasing car driven by Nicolas Lapierre, Matt Howson and Richard Bradley was awarded a stop-go for a pitlane infringement in the final minutes.

Porsche dominated in GTE Pro on the way to a second one-two in a row.

Richard Lietz and Michael Christensen took the win in their Manthey Porsche 911 RSR by just over seven seconds from team-mates Frederic Makowiecki and Patrick Pilet after getting ahead courtesy of a faster penultimate pitstop.

The AF Corse-run Ferrari 458 Italia driven by Viktor Shaitar, Aleksey Basov and Andrea Bertolini took GTE Am honours for the third race in a row.

RESULTS - 185 LAPS:

Pos Class Driver Team Car Gap
1 LMP1 T.Bernhard, M.Webber, B.Hartley Porsche Team Porsche 6h00m12.228s
2 LMP1 M.Fassler, A.Lotterer, B.Treluyer Audi Sport Team Joest Audi 1m06.840s
3 LMP1 L.di Grassi, L.Duval, O.Jarvis Audi Sport Team Joest Audi 1 Lap
4 LMP1 A.Davidson, S.Buemi, K.Nakajima Toyota Racing Toyota 2 Laps
5 LMP2 R.Rusinov, J.Canal, S.Bird G-Drive Racing Ligier/Nissan 15 Laps
6 LMP2 M.Howson, R.Bradley, N.Lapierre KCMG ORECA/Nissan 15 Laps
7 LMP2 G.Yacaman, P.Derani, R.Gonzalez G-Drive Racing Ligier/Nissan 16 Laps
8 LMP1 S.Trummer, P.Kaffer Team ByKolles CLM/AER 16 Laps
9 LMP2 S.Sharp, R.Dalziel, D.H.Hansson Extreme Speed Motorsports Ligier/HPD 16 Laps
10 LMP2 P.Ragues, O.Webb, A.Hamilton Team SARD Morand Morgan/SARD 16 Laps
11 LMP2 N.Panciatici, P-L.Chatin, V.Capillaire Signatech Alpine Alpine/Nissan 16 Laps
12 LMP1 R.Dumas, N.Jani, M.Lieb Porsche Team Porsche 17 Laps
13 LMP2 N.Leventis, D.Watts, J.Kane Strakka Racing Gibson/Nissan 19 Laps
14 GTE Pro R.Lietz, M.Christensen Porsche Team Manthey Porsche 23 Laps
15 GTE Pro P.Pilet, F.Makowiecki Porsche Team Manthey Porsche 23 Laps
16 GTE Pro D.Rigon, J.Calado AF Corse Ferrari 23 Laps
17 GTE Pro F.Rees, A.MacDowall, R.Stanaway Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin 24 Laps
18 GTE Pro M.Sorensen, C.Nygaard Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin 25 Laps
19 GTE Pro D.Turner, J.Adam Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin 25 Laps
20 GTE Pro G.Bruni, T.Vilander AF Corse Ferrari 25 Laps
21 GTE Am V.Shaytar, A.Bertolini, A.Basov SMP Racing Ferrari 26 Laps
22 GTE Am C.Ried, K.Al Qubaisi, E.Bamber Abu Dhabi-Proton Racing Porsche 26 Laps
23 GTE Am F.Perrodo, E.Collard, R.Aguas AF Corse Ferrari 27 Laps
24 GTE Am P.Dempsey, P.Long, M.Seefried Dempsey Racing - Proton Porsche 27 Laps
25 GTE Am P.D.Lana, P.Lamy, M.Lauda Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin 27 Laps
26 GTE Am F.Castellacci, B.Simonsen, S.Hall Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin 27 Laps
27 GTE Am G.Roda, P.Ruberti, K.Poulsen Larbre Competition Chevrolet 28 Laps
28 LMP1 A.Imperatori, D.Kraihamer, D.Abt Rebellion Racing Rebellion/AER 38 Laps
29 LMP1 N.Prost, M.Beche, N.Heidfeld Rebellion Racing Rebellion/AER 38 Laps
- LMP1 A.Wurz, S.Sarrazin, M.Conway Toyota Racing Toyota Retirement
- LMP2 E.Brown, J.van Overbeek, J.Fogarty Extreme Speed Motorsports Ligier/HPD Retirement

LEADING CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS:

Pos Driver Points
1 Andre Lotterer 113
1 Marcel Fassler 113
1 Benoit Treluyer 113
2 Timo Bernhard 103
2 Brendon Hartley 103
2 Mark Webber 103
3 Romain Dumas 77.5
3 Marc Lieb 77.5
3 Neel Jani 77.5
4 Oliver Jarvis 67
4 Loic Duval 67
4 Lucas di Grassi 67
5 Nick Tandy 66
6 Earl Bamber 58
7 Nico Hulkenberg 58
8 Sebastien Buemi 49
8 Anthony Davidson 49
9 Mike Conway 46
9 Stephane Sarrazin 46
9 Alexander Wurz 46
10 Kazuki Nakajima 45
11 Julien Canal 24.5
11 Roman Rusinov 24.5
11 Sam Bird 24.5

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