Bahrain 6 Hr Report: No.8 stretches ead in Hypercar; Iron Dames lead in LMGTE Am

Below are the main headlines following six hours of racing at the Bapco Energies 8 Hours of Bahrain.

HYPERCAR 

• No.8 Toyota Gazoo Racing GR010 Hypercar Stabilises lead over sister No.7 Toyota as Ryo Hirakawa and Jose-Maria Lopez respectively take their stints at the wheel. 
• After six hours of racing the No.8 leads by 41 seconds and looks to be cruising to its second win of the season after Portimao and the drivers title for Hirakawa, Buemi and Hartley. 
• Hertz Team Jota enjoys an excellent mid-phase of the race with Yifei Ye and then Antonio Felix da Costa usurping the No.50 Ferrari AF Corse 499P to grab third position. 
• Da Costa engaged in crowd pleasing battle with Nicklas Nielsen to take the podium place and then pull away impressively as the cooler night conditions appeared to suit the Gold liveried Porsche 963 
• But in the sixth hour disaster struck as da Costa ran wide at Turn 1 and was then adjudged to have re-joined the track in an unsafe manner. The resulting drive-through penalty drops the No.38 down to fourth position and behind the No.50 Ferrari. 
• But the Portuguese ace re-catches Nielsen and they reprise their earlier battle as they run nose-to-tail in battle for third. 
• In fifth place the No.51 Ferrari AF Corse 499P driven by Antonio Giovinazzi is just three seconds from da Costa. 
• No.6 and No.5 Porsche Penske’s continue in sixth and seventh positions as Andre Lotterer and Frederic Makowiecki in cockpit respectively. 
• Proton Competition place ninth just behind the No.93 Peugeot TotalEnergies 9X8. 
• Cadillac Racing continue to lap quickly in 11^th as Richard Westbrook gets his stints at the wheel. 
• Floyd Vanwall serve another penalty for track limit violations and run 12^th in Hypercar and 14^th overall

LMP2  

• No.23 United Autosports receives 90-second stop and go penalty for a minimum tyre pressure offence and drops from lead group after intense racing between them, No.31 Team WRT and No.9 Prema entries. 
• Bent Viscaal enjoys time in the lead but is spun around after being hit by Daniel Mancielli in the No.98 NorthWest AMR (Heart of Racing) Aston Martin Vantage, who serves a drive-through penalty for the incident. 
• At the six hour mark the No.31 Team WRT Oreca-Gibson with Ferdinand Habsburg at the wheel leads from the sister No.41 car as Robert Kubica consolidates early conservative running as team eye LMP2 title. 
• Third is the No.9 Prema entry with Juan Manuel Correa aboard, as he heads the similar No.63 car of Daniil Kvyat in fourth. 
• Jota Oreca-Gibson sits fifth as Pietro Fittipaldi takes over from Oliver Rasmussen and the Vector Sport entry places sixth albeit temporarily as the No.36 Alpine ELF Team car pits just before the seventh hour arrives. 
• The delayed No.23 United Autosports entry runs seventh ahead of the No.22 sister car which lost time earlier with penalty for first lap incident. 

LMGTE Am 

• Iron Lynx continue to lead but are forced to pit with two hours and 30mins remaining when it becomes clear that Claudio Schiavoni is not well enough to compete. 
• The team decide to retire the car rather than interfere with the result as they would be disqualified for not running a bronze categorised driver. 
• This means that Iron Dames lead as Rahel Frey enjoys a strong double stint and they lead the D’Station Aston Martin by 18-seconds. 
• But with Tomonobu Fuji set to run until the end of the race, the Aston Martin starts to make inroads on Frey’s lead.
• No.33 Corvette Racing run third as Nicolas Varonne completes a double stint but is 90-seconds behind the leading Iron Dames Porsche. 
• NorthWest AMR Aston Martin is fourth as they recover from drive-through after contact with No.9 Prema Racing Oreca-Gibson.