Porsche’s no. 2 crew of Marc Lieb, Neel Jani and Romain Dumas has inherited the race win from Sunday’s FIA World Endurance Championship season-opener at Silverstone after the no. 7 Audi R18 was excluded for failing a post-race scrutineering check.
Andre Lotterer, Benoit Treluyer and Marcel Fassler claimed an unlikely win at Silverstone, ending an 11-month drought dating back to last year’s 6 Hours of Spa.
However, they will now venture to Belgium next month without a win for a full calendar year after being excluded from the final classification by the stewards.
“Post-race scrutineering revealed that the No. 7 car was not in compliance with article 3.5.6 a3 of the LMP1 Technical Regulations (thickness of the front skid block), and the Stewards of the Meeting decided to exclude the car from the race, as detailed in Stewards’ Decision No.27,” a statement from the FIA read.
Audi was given until 23:55 BST to appeal the decision, and initially opted not to, but instead has within the window of appeal.
Audi confirmed as much in a statement:
For the moment, Porsche’s win streak extends to seven races, while Toyota claims an unlikely second place finish with its no. 6 TS050 Hybrid shared by Kamui Kobayashi, Stephane Sarrazin and Mike Conway.
The biggest winner from the No. 7 car’s exclusion is Rebellion Racing, which becomes the first non-factory team to finish on the overall race podium since the 6 Hours of Bahrain in 2013 by being promoted to P3 and P4.
You can see the provisional results for the 6 Hours of Silverstone here.