Alpine climbed back to the summit of the FIA World Championship podium in the series’ milestone 100th race at Fuji Speedway today (28 September), as Charles Milesi, Ferdinand Habsburg and Paul-Loup Chatin emerged on top in an epic encounter to claim the French manufacturer’s first victory in more than three years.
In front of a crowd of 66,400 enthusiastic Japanese fans, the #35 crew began the 6 Hours of Fuji from ninth on the 18-strong Hypercar grid, and initially fell down the field after picking up penalties for contact and a pit-stop infringement. The trio gained a crucial break shortly after the race entered its second half, however, when they benefitted from the fortuitous timing of a safety car intervention prompted by a clash between one of the Aston Martin Hypercars and the Heart of Racing Team’s LMGT3 entry.
That elevated Milesi up the order into second, with the Frenchman subsequently settling into a three-way fight for supremacy with Peugeot’s Mikkel Jensen – the #93 9X8 Hypercar the Dane shares with Jean-Éric Vergne and Paul di Resta a long-time leader in Japan – and defending world champion Kévin Estre in the #6 Porsche.
With an hour remaining, Alpine Endurance Team rolled the dice. As the top three came into the pits to make their final stops, the French manufacturer elected to save time by changing only the left-hand side tyres on the #35 car, whereas Peugeot and Porsche both replaced the full set.
That promoted Milesi to the lead, and the Frenchman thereafter produced a flawless performance to keep his pursuers comfortably at bay and take the chequered flag 7.682 seconds clear of Jensen – to the evident delight of his team-mates and crew.
“This means everything,” confessed an emotional Habsburg, whose previous FIA WEC win coincidentally came on the same day as that of Alpine. “Holding this trophy has been in my dreams for quite some time.
“It’s the coolest thing to win a race with two of your best friends in the paddock. Charles and Paul-Loup are not only some of the best drivers, but also the best people that I know. For me, it’s been a long path from breaking my back last year, missing races and struggling to get back up to speed. They have motivated me so much through my own mistakes and moments when I was not doing so well.
“Philippe [Sinault – Team Principal] put us together at a risk because we are completely the wrong size drivers to share a car! Charles and I should never be in a car together, but Philippe trusted our personalities, and it’s because of them all that we were able to win as a team.”
The result represented Alpine’s third overall triumph in FIA WEC, and impressively, the #35 car is the only one in the 2025 Hypercar field not to include a top-level Platinum-graded driver. It also means that for the first time in the championship’s history, four different marques have won in succession – Ferrari at Le Mans, Cadillac in São Paulo, Porsche at COTA and now Alpine at Fuji.
Peugeot celebrated its best result in the series’ top-tier to-date with the runner-up spoils, as Jensen held off a determined Laurens Vanthoor (#6 Porsche Penske Motorsport) in the closing laps. With the sister factory Porsche placing fourth ahead of the #94 Peugeot, Ferrari – neither of whose factory 499P Hypercars troubled the scorers – must wait until the season finale in Bahrain in its quest to clinch a maiden Manufacturers’ world championship crown, while no fewer than four crews remain in contention for Drivers’ honours.
Further down the top ten in the final Fuji classification, there were contrasting fortunes. Aston Martin THOR Team celebrated the Valkyrie’s finest finish to-date in sixth, although it was very much a case of what might have been in a race in which the #009 car shared by Marco Sørensen and Alex Riberas genuinely looked like challenging for the podium, only to concede ground due to a drive-through penalty for a Full Course Yellow infringement and contact.
Qualifying pace-setters Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA dominated the opening exchanges but ultimately flattered to deceive after losing out during the third-hour safety car intervention. The pole-sitting #12 V-Series.R ultimately ended up seventh, one spot ahead of the #8 TOYOTA GAZOO Racing entry, as the much-decorated Japanese manufacturer was unable to produce its usual stellar form on home soil and has now gone an unprecedented seven races without ascending the podium.
Corvette claims LMGT3 glory after late drama in Japan
For the second race in a row, VISTA AF Corse took the chequered flag first in the LMGT3 category in the FIA World Endurance Championship at Fuji Speedway – and for the second race in a row, another crew stood atop the podium, as TF Sport’s #81 Corvette benefitted from a post-race penalty for the Ferrari to usurp the win.
In the early stages, McLaren looked to be in the box seats as United Autosports duo Darren Leung and James Cottingham overhauled pole-sitter Anthony McIntosh in Racing Spirit of Léman’s Aston Martin Vantage.
In an immensely impressive display, Cottingham streaked clear of the field in the #59 entry, establishing an advantage of more than half-a-minute before handing over to Sébastien Baud at one-third distance.
The Frenchman initially continued that good work, holding sway until a flying Rahel Frey swept past and into the lead shortly after mid-distance in the Iron Dames Porsche, which benefitted from the first of the race’s three safety car interventions.
Riccardo Pera in the championship-leading Manthey 1st Phorm car followed suit shortly afterwards to make it a Porsche one-two, as a suspected electrical issue dropped the #59 car down the order – its crew’s woes compounded by a late 30-second stop-and-go for overtaking multiple cars behind the safety car.
Notwithstanding a brace of early setbacks – with last year’s Fuji pole-sitter François Hériau finding himself spun round by both Manthey rival Ryan Hardwick and Alpine Hypercar driver Frédéric Makowiecki – the #21 VISTA AF Corse Ferrari gradually worked its way up the order and hauled itself into contention as the race progressed.
With an hour-and-a-quarter left on the clock, Ferrari factory driver Alessio Rovera held an advantage of almost ten seconds as his pursuers squabbled in his wake. Despite the top four needing to make a late splash ‘n’ dash for fuel as the chequered flag approached, the Ferrari still looked set to secure its second victory of 2025 until news filtered through that the car had been hit with a five-second penalty for having had too many team members in the fast lane during its final pit-stop.
Initially, that did not look set to pose too great a problem as Rovera was almost ten seconds clear of closest rival Charlie Eastwood in the #81 TF Sport Corvette, but a slow final lap enabled the Irishman to close to within two seconds of the silver Ferrari – which, with the penalty applied, translated into a first triumph of the season.
“For a long time, I didn’t have a clue what was going on!” joked Eastwood. “Half the grid was on a split-strategy and at one point we were seventh, but we chipped away to move closer to the front. We knew we were able to go the longest on fuel but that it was going to be nip-and-tuck. There was quite a small gap once we came out of the pits, but we had really good pace at the end.
“I came around on the second-to-last lap and they mentioned the gap was 7.2 seconds but that there was a five-second time penalty [for the Ferrari], so I figured I may as well keep pushing to see how we got on. I could see it getting closer and closer on the last lap, and to take the win was unbelievable.
“It was right place, right time but also you have to execute and everything went right towards the end. We’ve been pretty unlucky the last couple of years to say the least, so it’s great to get my first win in FIA WEC with these guys (Andrade and Van Rompuy) and my first win in the championship since moving to Corvette. I’m super-pleased.”
The #21 VISTA Ferrari held on to claim second from Team WRT’s twin BMW M4 Evos – the #31 reaching the bottom step of the rostrum ahead of the #46 – representing a welcome fillip for the Belgian team, which has endured a challenging campaign in the category.
Manthey finished fifth, which means the battle for title glory will go down to the wire in the Bahrain finale, where four crews will fight it out for overall honours.
The Bapco Energies 8 Hours of Bahrain will take place from 6-8 November.
