Genesis Takes Its First WEC Pole in Barcelona, Then Leaves Without Points
Mathys Jaubert put the GMR-001 on pole for the 6 Hours of Barcelona, but a gravel trip and systems faults left both cars outside the top ten.
Genesis Magma Racing finally had the fastest car in the FIA World Endurance Championship for a lap. Mathys Jaubert put the #17 GMR-001 Hypercar on pole for the 6 Hours of Barcelona, the team's first in the series, and Mathieu Jaminet qualified the sister #19 in third. Sunday was a different story: neither car scored, and the best finish was 11th.
The weekend fits the pattern of the brand's debut season. Genesis has had the raw pace for a while, but turning it into points has been harder, as its seventh place at COTA in September showed after a first-lap spin nearly wrecked that race.
Pole on Saturday, gravel on Sunday
The signs were there early. The #17 was second-fastest in the second practice session and the #19 matched that in the third, and both cars made Hyperpole. There, Jaubert, a graduate of the team's own driver development program, set two laps quick enough for pole.
Overnight rain forced the whole field to start on wet tires. André Lotterer led briefly from pole before Dani Juncadella's #19 dove past him under braking for Turn 1. The lead lasted four corners. Juncadella misjudged the grip at Turn 5, slid through the gravel, and dropped to last in the Hypercar class.
From there, both cars fought off-track moments and intermittent systems faults that, according to the team, cost valuable time. Lotterer said his car's technical problems began after the first Virtual Safety Car. The #17 also took a drive-through penalty and finished 16th, three laps down, with Jaubert and Pipo Derani completing the race.
The #19 recovered once Paul-Loup Chatin and then Jaminet took over. Genesis says Jaminet got the car to within half a second of tenth, the last points-paying spot, but the car finished 11th, a lap down.
Toyota takes the title, Genesis looks to Monza
Up front, Toyota scored a one-two, with the #8 of Sébastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley, and Ryo Hirakawa winning ahead of the #7. That result clinched the manufacturers' title for Toyota with one round left. The #50 Ferrari took third.
For Genesis, Barcelona extended a run of near-misses. The team scored its first points at Spa in May and then took seventh at COTA, but at Fuji last month its cars finished 11th and 15th. The momentum it carried into the Japanese round hasn't yet produced a race with both cars in the top ten.
Chief engineer Justin Taylor blamed a handful of small technical issues that took too long to fix. Lotterer summed it up more bluntly: "We've been strong in qualifying, but we need to improve on Sunday."
The GMR-001, powered by a 3.2-liter V8, gets one more chance this year. The season finale, the 6 Hours of Monza, runs on November 8.
