Ferrari's Fuji 6 Hours ends in tenth place for no. 51 499P as no. 50 retires
Ferrari leaves Japan with tenth place for the number 51 499P as its best result at the Fuji 6 Hours, the third-to-last round of the 2026 FIA WEC.
- 26.443 seconds
- 10 seconds
- 115 (third, 54 behind the leader)
- 18 October, Barcelona (six hours)
What Happened
Ferrari's best result at the Fuji 6 Hours was tenth place for the number 51 499P, the third-to-last round of the FIA WEC 2026. The number 83 car, in its yellow livery and entered by AF Corse, finished twelfth, while the official Ferrari – AF Corse team's other 499P, number 50, was forced to retire early. The race proved complex for the 499Ps, which started outside the Top-10 after qualifying was cancelled due to the weather conditions, with the starting grid set from the free practice session times.
The team, coming off pole position and a win at Austin, split its strategies to try to close the gap to its rivals, particularly on tyres: the number 50 and 51 499Ps started on 'mixed' solutions with Medium and Soft compounds, while number 83 began on four Medium tyres. Despite this, the Ferraris endured an uphill race and could not join the battle for the leading positions.
- Number 51 (Calado, Pier Guidi, Giovinazzi): tenth, 26.443 seconds behind the leader, with a 10-second penalty applied after the finish for two contacts during the middle hours.
- Number 83 (Yifei Ye, Phil Hanson, Robert Kubica): twelfth, one lap down, the lap lost in the middle stages when the Safety Car intervention did not work in the yellow car's favour.
- Number 50 (Fuoco, Molina, Nielsen): retired, after an issue during a pit stop in the third hour and then a technical problem that forced the Spanish driver to stop the car at the side of the track less than two hours from the end.
- Seventh, 59 points (30 behind the leader)
- Ninth, 54 points
- Fifteenth, 31 points
115points
Third place, 54 points behind the leader, with two rounds remaining.
“Everything that could go wrong went wrong. The choice of tyres at the start was perhaps not ideal, but we could still have made it work, had it not been for the many restarts after the Safety Car. It was very difficult to get the tyres back up to temperature. Then we had two penalties, which we could not serve in the pits again because of the neutralisation, which cancelled out the gaps and worked against us in this sense. We will quickly put this race behind us and look ahead.”
“The Fuji race was very difficult and we are aware that we made some mistakes, as well as having an issue with reliability. We need to take stock quickly and finish the season on a high, trying to give our all in the two remaining races. Congratulations to our rivals on the win.”
Previously from Ferrari N.V.
Earlier in the same Fuji weekend, Ferrari's number 50 AF Corse crew of Fuoco, Molina and Nielsen was third fastest in Free Practice 1 at Fuji, then slipped to 11th in the afternoon session. It was the third-to-last round of the 2026 FIA WEC. Away from the endurance paddock, Ferrari also ran the Azerbaijan Grand Prix weekend in Formula 1, where Lewis Hamilton set the third-fastest time and Charles Leclerc the fifth in the final practice session.
- Ferrari's 499Ps open Fuji WEC weekend third-fastest in first practice
- Hamilton third, Leclerc fifth for Ferrari in final Azerbaijan GP practice
Background drawn from MotorClaw's earlier coverage of Ferrari N.V.'s official releases.
Why this matters
Fuji was a setback in Ferrari's title defence: the no. 51 crew, whose drivers are the reigning World Drivers' Champions, now sits seventh in the standings, 30 points behind the leader. The race also cost the no. 50 car, which retired with a technical problem and dropped to ninth, leaving Ferrari third in the Manufacturers' Championship, 54 points adrift with two rounds left.
Terms in This Story
- FIA WEC
- The FIA World Endurance Championship, a global series of long-distance sports car races contested by manufacturer teams.
- Hypercar
- The top class of endurance racing in the WEC, featuring purpose-built hybrid racing cars from major manufacturers.
- Safety Car
- A course vehicle that leads the field at reduced speed during a hazard, bunching the cars together and neutralising gaps between them.
Summarised from the linked release; details can be imperfect — always verify against the original source.