Ferrari dominates WEC season opener in Qatar, Magnussen fourth with BMW

Ferrari produced a dominant performance in the opening race of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) in Qatar, not only by winning the race, but also by taking an historic 1-2-3, filling the entire podium. Former Formula 1 driver Kevin Magnussen finished fourth with BMW alongside his teammates Dries Vanthoor and Raffaele Marciello.

At some part during the 10-hour race, all three Ferraris held the lead. The #51 car of James Calado, Alessandro Pier Guidi and former Alfa Romeo F1 driver Antonio Giovinazzi seemed to be in control, but a time penalty for Giovinazzi caused the team to fall back, with the #83 AF Corse Ferrari taking the lead after an incident saw the #50 Ferrari spun around by a BMW.

In the closing stages, Fuoco managed to retake the lead during the final pit stop, keeping F1 race-winner Robert Kubica in the #83 car behind until the finish. Kubica, along with Yifei Ye and Philip Hanson, finished just a few tenths of a second ahead of Pier Guidi, completing Ferrari's historic top-three, the first time since the 1967 Daytona 24 Hours that Ferrari occupied the entire podium.

BMW M Team WRT finished fourth with the #15 BMW M Hybrid V8 driven by Vanthoor, Marciello and Magnussen despite an early setback due to a technical problem and a collision with another car, recovering very well to finish as the best of the rest.

Reigning champion Toyota Gazoo Racing had to settle for fifth and sixth respectively, with the #8 car of Sebastian Buemi, Brendan Hartley and Ryo Hirakawa finishing ahead of teammates Nyck De Vries, Kamui Kobayashi and Mike Conway in the #7 car. In the LMGT3 class, it was the #33 Corvette that took victory.

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