Video: Porsche 919 vs Toyota TS040 at Goodwood

11th June 2020

Ben Miles

The latest heyday of endurance sportscar racing came sometime around 2015/16. When Audi, Porsche and Toyota were battling it out in the top class in some of the most advanced racing cars the world had ever seen. (The less said about the Nissan GT-R LM Nismo, the better).

It has become tradition for the leading competitors at the Le Mans 24 Hours to hot foot it directly over from La Sarthe to the Festival of Speed presented by Mastercard, and 2015 was no different. The Porsche 919 had just clinched Porsche’s first Le Mans victory since 1997 and the Toyota TS040 was, albeit to slightly different regulations, the reigning World Endurance Champion. And we were lucky enough to have the pair of them running back-to-back on the Hill, with both being pushed as hard as they could.

What you don’t see is that the third competitor for Le Mans glory in 2015, the Audi R18 e-tron quattro, went up between them, but that just allows us more time to see Ant Davidson properly hustling his Toyota and then future WEC champion (and F1 driver) Brendan Hartley giving it the beans in the 919. Sportscar racing will miss LMP1 hybrid cars when they retire next year.