Given that the FIA WEC hadn't stopped off at the Fuji circuit since 2019, Toyota Gazoo Racing were extremely keen to put in an exemplary performance before their home crowd. The Japanese manufacturer used its home advantage to outclass its rivals Alpine Elf Team and Peugeot TotalEnergies. The #8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid driven by Brendon Hartley, Sébastien Buemi and Ryo Hirakawa triumphed ahead of the #7 car, with the #36 Alpine A480-Gibson finishing third, two laps behind the winners. “We had an amazing car today and the race was incredibly smooth,” Brandon Hartley conceded. “It doesn’t often happen like that. On our car, we saw the track temperatures were likely to be high, so we went a different direction on set-up and it worked. We were a bit quicker than the sister car. Séb did a strong first stint, then I was able to build a gap and Ryo drove well at the end.  It was one of those races where everything just worked perfectly.”

This win places the #8 Toyota crew at the top of the current standings in the Hypercar World Endurance Drivers' Championship. The #36 Alpine is now in second place, with the same number of points: 121. The title will thus be decided at the 8 Hours of Bahrain. In the Hypercar World Endurance Manufacturers' Championship standings, Toyota leads the way with a 26-point advantage over Alpine.

The 6 Hours of Fuji was the second endurance race for the Peugeot 9X8 fielded by Peugeot TotalEnergies. The #93 came fourth, seven laps behind the winning Toyota. However, the #94 encountered technical issues and finished 20th. “This race revealed the considerable progress the team, mechanics and engineers have made since Monza. We have resolved all the reliability issues we experienced at our first race, and the two days of practice at Fuji, along with the first two hours of the race itself passed off without incident. If we continue to progress at this rate ahead of Bahrain, it will be extremely positive,” said Olivier Jansonnie, WEC programme technical director for Peugeot Sport.

In LMGTE Pro, the #51 Ferrari 488 GTE Evo steered by James Calado and Alessandro Pier Guidi clinched its second win of the season. The sister car took the second spot on the podium, and the #92 Porsche 911 RSR-19 was third. In the GTE Manufacturers FIA World Endurance Championship, a single point separates Ferrari and Porsche, with the advantage going to the Italian marque.

The #31 Oreca 07-Gibson de WRT also took its second win of 2022. Robin Frijns, Dries Vanthoor and Sean Gelael finished out front, ahead of the JOTA #38 Oreca. The #9 Oreca from Prema Orlen Team looked set to bag the third place in LMP2, until it ran out of fuel just minutes from the end of the race, pushing it back to P6. The JOTA #28 Oreca thus finished third. JOTA tops the standings for the FIA Endurance Trophy for LMP2 Teams. The British outfit has a 28-point lead over United Autosports USA and 34 points more than Realteam by WRT.

The #33 Aston Martin Vantage AMR fielded by TF Sport won in the LMGTE Am class. A great way to come back after the accident in Monza. “There was not a single full course yellow, no safety cars, it was full throttle the whole way for six hours, so it came down to a fuel mileage race, which was hugely interesting from a strategy standpoint,” Ben Keating summed up, after taking victory with teammates Marco Sorensen and Henrique Chaves.  
Finishing second, the all-female driver squad made up of Rahel Frey, Michelle Gatting and Sarah Bovy achieved its best FIA WEC result so far after a very strong race. Japanese team D’Station Racing also claimed a podium spot at its home race.

The 8 Hours of Bahrain, the final round of the 2022 FIA WEC will take place on 12 November. In the meantime, check out this gallery of pictures from the 6 Hours of Fuji.