Buemi says full course yellows key to 'slower' Toyota's WEC Spa win
Toyota driver Sebastien Buemi says two full course yellow periods were key to his and his team-mates' victory over the sister TS050 HYBRID in Saturday's Spa World Endurance Championship race
The #7 car, driven by Mike Conway and Kamui Kobayashi following Jose Maria Lopez's withdrawal due to injury, established an early lead and appeared well placed to win.
But it lost out on two poorly-timed full course yellow flag periods in the middle and latter parts of the race, giving the #8 car shared by Buemi and team-mates Anthony Davidson and Kazuki Nakajima a lead of 40 seconds.
Conway and Kobayashi were able to home in on the sister car in the latter stages, but the pair fell short as Kobayashi finished just under two seconds behind Buemi at the finish.
"Today we were not the fastest by far, #7 really would have deserved it, but they lost so much time in the full course yellow and we made so much time," said Buemi.
"We never had the pace since Thursday, so it is quite impressive that without being the quickest we managed to win.
"We had a bit of luck; on the other hand last year we were leading by one lap we had an engine failure.
"I think we got the right tyres to start with, I was just not quick enough and Mike was really fast, he has been really fast all weekend."
Davidson added: "Certainly we had the luck, and if anyone says that you make your own luck in racing, they can think again.
"The full course yellows coming in gave us basically a minute advantage overall. That's really where we won the race."
#7 CREW 'SCREWED' BY FCYs
Conway said the timing of the full course yellows had wrecked his and Kobayashi's race, having developed a set-up edge over the #8 car between themselves.
"In the first part of the race we were quick and managed to build up a nice lead, but we got screwed with the two full course yellows just right at the wrong time," he said.
"Me and Kamui had some really good track time, being the two of us out there.
"That helped, and we just got the car in a really good window and the race pace was spot on really.
"We were out front controlling it, just [had] a bit of bad luck.
"We gave it everything, even at the end it was very close."
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