The latest round of the FIA World Endurance Championship was ultimately a frustrating one for Mike Conway last weekend at the 6 hours of  Nürburgring. 
Hopes were high following strong performances at Spa-Francorchamps and Le Mans, but those were dashed when the TS050 Hybrids lost time early in the race due to a tyre compound which was not ideal for the track temperatures.

Stéphane Sarrazin, Mike Conway and Kamui Kobayashi suffered a technical problem on their way to sixth in the #6 car. That meant a disappointing debut for the ultra-high-downforce aerodynamic package which has been developed for the remaining WEC races, although competitive lap times later in the race offered some encouragement.

A crowd of 58,000 (weekend figure) watched Mike take the start from the third row on tyres intended for higher track temperatures. Compounds for the first stint must be chosen before qualifying, and the race-day track temperatures proved lower than expected. Therefore, the team decided to swap tyre compounds on the car. This improved the situation and brought performance back to a more competitive level, although by that time the leading group was out of reach.

The middle section of the race was punctuated by several full course yellows but the TS050 Hybrids were running well until the #6 car needed five minutes of repairs in the garage. From that point, the target was to reach the chequered flag without further incident, which was achieved.

Speaking after the weekend, Mike said: “That was a hard race for the whole team. We didn’t have the pace at the beginning and then, when we were looking reasonably competitive, we had an issue with the car. So that was unfortunate for us. The other car had a difficult race as well so it’s not been a good weekend all in all. Hopefully it gets better over the remainder of the season.”

Images courtesy of www.psp-images.co.uk