Sarrazin to drive #8 for Toyota Racing at Le Mans

TOYOTA Racing have confirmed that Stéphane Sarrazin will drive the #8 TS030 HYBRID at the Le Mans 24 Hours. Toyota Racing were actively seeking a replacement for Hiroaki Ishiura to drive the #8 TS030 Hybrid which will contest the Le Mans 24 Hours. The Japanese manufacturer has recruited Stephane Sarrazin, who has ten appearances at Le Mans to his credit and is a former driver of Peugeot Sport. The Frenchman took the wheel of the hybrid car on the Paul Ricard circuit in the test session scheduled this week.

Stephane Sarrazin set three pole position times in a row for Peugeot Sport between 2007 and 2009 and even held the record for fastest lap in the race from 2008 to 2010. With the cancellation of plans for the Peugeot 908, the French driver quickly found a new ride: first was at Luxury Racing in the cockpit of a Ferrari, Stephane Sarrazin finally found refuge in the American team Starworks Motorsports, who have an HPD-Honda in the FIA World Endurance Championship. With team-mates Ryan Dalziel and Vicente Potolicchio, he finished on the overall podium of the 12 Hours of Sebring, opening round of the Championship last March.

Stéphane Sarrazin: “I am really happy and proud to get this chance to participate at Le Mans for TOYOTA Racing. I have good memories of working with TMG; they work very hard and it is a real pleasure to be back. It has been quite intense this week to become familiar with the team and the car, but I have received great support and I feel we have made good progress. It is a steep learning curve with a completely new technology and we will no doubt learn a lot this season. It’s a new and exciting challenge for me.”

Stephane Sarrazin and Sebastien Buemi and his team-mates Anthony Davidson, also a former driver of Peugeot Sport, will meet next week in La Sarthe for the Test Day of the 24 Hours of Le Mans on Sunday 3rd June.

Dave Davies