2017 FIA WEC season kicks off with the Prologue at Monza

The 2017 FIA World Endurance Championship season kicks off with two-day official test, so-called Prologue, at Autodromo Nazionale Monza. Almost the entire FIA WEC field met at the iconic Italian race track, with 27 cars taking a part in a test at the 5.793 kilometre long high-speed circuit.

Lapierre was the fastest with Toyota TS050

The Porsche LMP Team, the reigning world champions, introduced the latest version of Porsche 919 Hybrid which will fight against updated Toyota TS050 Hybrid for the overall and LMP1 laurels in the 2017 season. Both manufacturers ran two cars at Monza. At the Prologue, Toyota set the overall best lap time, with Nicolas Lapierre’s lap od 1:30.547. Neel Jani recorded the fastest lap for a Porsche 919 Hybrid when lapping the Monza’s lap for 1:31.666 minutes.

In the LMP2 class, the #28 Oreca 07-Gibson of TDS Racing was the fastest car in the test, with a lap time of 1:36.078.

The #92 Porsche was the fastest among GT cars at the Prologue

GTE test results: Porsche 911 faster than Ford GT

In the GTE field, Michael Christensen was the fastest driver with new #92 Porsche 911 RSR, setting a best lap of 1:47.379 on Saturday morning. His teammate Frederic Makowiecki was the second-fastest, with Harry Tincknell in the third place with #67 Ford GT. In the LMGTE Am class, WEC rookie Miguel Molina set the fastest time in the #54 Spirit of Race Ferrari 488 GTE.

Of the 28 full season entries, 27 appeared at Monza. Only the CEFC Manor TRS Racing team missing with their #25 ORECA 07-Gibson. The next stop for the FIA WEC participants is the opening round of the 2017 season, the 6 Hours of Silverstone, which takes place at the home of British motor racing from April 14 to April 15.

Photos: Porsche, Toyota Motorsport, fiawec.com/John Rourke,