Toyota wins at Le Mans again after four years with a double podium

Yesterday was a bit of a landmark day for sports in general. The New York Knicks beat the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA Finals for their first championship title in 53 years, and we saw the second set of qualifiers for the FIFA World Cup, to name a few.

As for the world of motorsports, Lewis Hamilton gets his maiden win with Ferrari. This masterclass of strategy, race pace, and a newly upgraded led the Briton to his first win since July 2024. This was also the first all-British podium in 60 years, with George Russell (Mercedes) and Lando Norris (McLaren), after two heartbreaking retirements from Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) and Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) shook up the order.

And as for the concurrent 24 Hours of Le Mans, we see Toyota Racing take the top spot of the hallowed endurance race for the first time in four years. This momentum comes after the team won its 100th World Endurance Championship (WEC) race back in April.

And this is more than just finishing first—Toyota’s sixth win at Le Mans involved a double podium finish, with Car #7 driven by Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi, and Nyck de Vries finishing in first, just 10.913 seconds ahead of the BMW M Hybrid V8 (Car #20) of Robin Frijns, René Rast, and Sheldon van der Linde, with the Car #8 Toyota driven by Sébastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley and Ryō Hirakawa trailing in third place, separated by 20.417 seconds from the lead—a very tight podium for an endurance race.

Despite having relatively disappointing starting positions, with Car #7 qualifying for P14 and Car #8 in P15, the Toyota Racing team ran a very aggressive strategy that brought them to the top six contenders with multiple fastest lap records, but #7 suffered an early puncture, while #8 had a more eventful race by going off the track, getting a drive-through penalty, and having to go through a long brake drum mounting repair.

Despite this, a safety car reset the field at around six hours to go, and multiple overtakes from the team put the cars in a one-two lead. However, Car #8 had to change tires in the last hour, with it dropping to third place and conceding second to the BMW M Hybrid V8 (Car #20).

This result puts Toyota Racing in the lead of the manufacturer’s championship in the FIA World Endurance Championship with 36 points, with the team of Car #7 leading in the driver’s standings.

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This also feels like a redemption arc for the car that the TR010 shares its livery with—the Toyota GT-One (TS020), specifically the 1998 version.

In 1999, after the two cars were retired after incidents and accidents, the last remaining GT-One was closing up the gap on the leading BMW V12 LMR on the last hour of the race, only for the TS020 to have a tire burst. This heartbreaking result led to Toyota finishing second, and BMW taking its first-ever win at Le Mans. For the Bavarians, this latest result is also their return to the podium in endurance racing since 1999.

^{Photos from Ferrari, Toyota, BMW}