6 Hours of Sao Paulo – Free Practice 3: Toyota back in the lead, positive results for Alpine and Peugeot

After a start delayed by about twenty minutes for safety reasons, the 36 cars were released. While the weather conditions were not necessarily the best, with a very threatening sky, the lap times of the best hypercars were similar to those of the second free practice session.

But, contrary to Friday’s practice sessions, the Porsches were not at the top of the premier category. The Toyota #8 set the best time with 1:23.695. The Ferrari #50 returned to the podium for a session, and the BMW #15 remained in third place, just like in the second session yesterday. However, the gaps were much larger, as the Japanese car left everyone trailing by more than half a second.

At the level of the French teams, this session was much better than the previous two as three cars were in the top 10: the Alpine #35 in 6th, the Peugeot #94 in 9th, and the Alpine #36 in 10th.

The Porsches, which had dominated the trials this Friday, were trailing this Saturday morning. They occupied the last two places. However, the cars from Stuttgart were performing different work than the competitors.

In GT3, the #33 Corvette from TF Sport finished this practice hour in first position (1:34.414), seven hundredths ahead of the #10 Aston Martin from Racing Spirit of Léman. With a good qualifying performance by the rookie driver, the French team could compete for pole position this afternoon.

A Ford Mustang, the #88, and a Mercedes, the #61, were in the top 10. A performance indicative of progress for these two cars that have had difficulties since the beginning of the season. On the other hand, mixed results for the Porsches: the #85 from Iron Dames finished in tenth position, and the #92 from Manthey in 16th place.