Sebastien Buemi set the early pace for Toyota Gazoo Racing in opening practice for the 6 Hours of Fuji on Friday as the Japanese manufacturer came quickly🤡 out of the blocks to start its home race weekend.

Despite being hit with a reduction in hybrid power and petrol energy per lap following i꧃ts victory in the FIA World Endurance Championship season-opener at Silverstone last month, Toyota remained at the head of the field through FP1, 🤡albeit just two-tenths of a second clear of the leading privateer LMP1 car.

Buemi recorded a fastest la𝄹p time of 1m27.373s early in the session to take top spot in the #8 Toyota TS050 Hybrid, beating Rebellion Racing's Norman Nato in the #1 R13 Gibson by 0.286s after﷽ the Frenchman put in a late lap to break up Toyota's one-two.

Kamui Kobayashi dropped to third in the #7 Toyota as a result of Nato's effort as he finished four-tenths off Buemi’s benchmark, while the pair of Team LNT Ginettas took fourth and fifth through Ben Hanley and Charl🎃ie Robertson respectively.

High Class Racing mဣanaged to lead the way in LMP2 through Kenta Yamashita in the #33 Oreca 07 Gibson, finishing seven-tenths of a second clear of Nyck de Vries in the #29 Racing Team Nederland entry. Cool Racing took P3 in class, a further two-tenths off the pace.

Following its victory at Sil﷽verstone, Porsche continued to set the pace in GTE-Pro as Gianmaria Bruni headed up a one-two finish for the German marque in the #91 Porsche 911 RSR, his lap of 1m38.315s one-tenth of a second up on that of Michael Christensen in the sister #♓92 Porsche. Davide Rigon took third in class for AF Corse in the #71 Ferrari 488 GTE Evo.

TF Sport topped GTE-Am through Jonny Adam in #90 Aston Martin, edging out Ken Cozzolino in MR Racing’s #70 Ferrari by 0.029 seconds to leꦏad the class.