The Toyotas dominated qualifying, with #7 taking pole ahead of Buemi’s #8 team, and the two cars swapped and changed places throughout the first stint before a high speed crash took the #7 car of Jose Maria Lopez, Mike Conway, and Kamui Koboyashi.
With half an hour remaining, the #2 Porsche stole the lead of the race from the Toyota as a strategic gamble paid off. The Porsche, piloted by Brendon Hartley, stopped only for fuel while the Toyota swapped tyres for the final push. That put Hartley into the lead of the race with Buemi eight seconds behind him.
Buemi set about cutting into the Porsche’s lead, and stole the lead of the race with twelve minutes left on the clock. Hartley wasn’t able to reclaim the lead, and Buemi crossed the line to take his and Davidson’s first wins since 2014.
The #1 Porsche of Neel Jani, Nick Tandy, and Andre Lotterer completed the podium as the only other car to finish on the lead lap.
In LMP2, the #38 of Jackie Chan DC Racing lead Rebellion Racing’s #31 across the line.
G-Drive Racing’s #26 started the race on pole, but defending champions Signatech quickly took the class lead. The trio of Gustavos Menezes, Matt Rao, and Nicolas Lapierre lead the class comfortably for the first part of the race, before full course yellows allowed the rest of the class to position themselves for an attack.
The #31 and #38 spent the remainder of the race swapping positions, but it was eventually the trio of Ho-Pin Tung, Thomas Laurent, and Oliver Jarvis who crossed the line first, nearly 20 seconds ahead of Rebellion’s Bruno Senna, Nico Prost, and Julien Canal.
TDS Racing’s #28 car completed the podium, with car #36 finishing fourth in class.
The GTE class saw lots of changes at the front, but it was a win for pole sitters Andy Priaulx, Harry Tincknell and Pipo Derani. The team was plagued with an opening door problem, which forced the #67 car to pit early, but the team soon returned to the class lead.
Throughout the race, multiple cars controlled the class lead. The other Ford was the biggest challenge for most of the race, but the #66 car fell away in the final stages of the 6 Hours. The #51 Ferrari eventually took the second place after slowly climbing up from sixth in class. The #91 Porsche completed the podium, after its stablemate caught fire in the fourth hour of the race.
In the GTE Am class, Clearwater Racing’s car #61 took the class win. The #98 Aston Martin had led the class for almost the entire race, only for a last lap crash to hand the victory to the Clearwater team. Aston Martin’s Paul Dalla Lana, Pedro Lamy, and Mathias Lauda did get to stand on the podium with their second place finish, with the Dempsey-Proton Racing’s #77 completing the podium.
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A sign of what's to come this season, or will Porsche come back in round two?
Image credit: Caroline Rhea
just a wec pic and results inside or something? I know it doesn't work that way, but I wish it could 
