Three decades after his countryman Masanori Sekiya helped McLaren to its first Le Mans 24 Hours win, Japanese driver Marino Sato had his breakthrough WEC performance, leading United Autosports and McLaren to its first WEC LMGT3 victory on Sunday at COTA.
Sato ended up with the advantage of being one of a handful of GT cars that gambled on taking slick tires, when the No. 95 McLaren LMGT3 Evo made its final pit stop. But the advantage wasn’t so clear-cut when Sato came in with about 34 minutes to go.
“That tire strategy at the end was ultimately the right call. But at the time it was really 50-50,” Sato admitted post-race.
“From five laps before we had to pit, I was on the radio for like, forever and a lap just discussing is it dry enough, or do we have to go to wets. The team had a really big conversation about what tire we were going with. Ultimately, we made the right choice.”
It seemed as if staying on wet tires would be the winning strategy for a while, as those that had put on slicks were struggling for grip, Sato included. “I didn’t find the grip in the initial five or six laps [after pitting] where I was very much struggling,” he said.
“But once it passed that phase and it dried up more, that’s when our car came to life, And that’s where I felt much more confident than the other cars, when I started to hunt down the lead.”
He was quick and composed when the crossover tilted towards himself and the other slick runners. Overtaking both the No. 77 Proton Competition Mustang and the No. 92 Manthey 1st Phorm Porsche around the outside of COTA’s triple-apex right hander moved Sato up to second and allowed him to stay in touch with then-leader Davide Rigon.
He also had to keep the No. 46 Team WRT BMW of Kelvin van der Linde – who was on the same strategy – behind him, not the easiest task given van der Linde’s GT racing credentials.
And by remaining composed, Sato and the No. 95 United McLaren would take the win after the No. 54 Vista AF Corse Ferrari was given a five-second post-race time penalty, for causing an avoidable collision with the No. 77 Ford at turn 11.
“I really wanted to pass the Ferrari on track. I feel like I had the momentum, but I didn’t have the right moment with the Hypercar traffic,” Sato lamented, as at times his car was quicker through the corners than some of the Hypercars that were still on wet tires – including the winning No. 6 Porsche 963.
It was a well-earned first WEC victory for Sato, and a first win for his co-drivers Darren Leung and Sean Gelael since they joined United from Team WRT in the off-season. Sato thanked his co-drivers for putting him in a position to hunt down Rigon towards the end, while also expressing his happiness that the team’s efforts since joining LMGT3 with McLaren last year were finally rewarded with a victory.
“I’ve been in this McLaren United team for a season longer than these two and I know a bit more than these guys how much I thought that the team put in. And I feel like we’ve finally managed to showcase it,” he continued.
“I’m very happy with everything, the team and our strategy call and management.”
Sato’s victory was also the first for a Japanese driver in one of the WEC’s GT classes since Keita Sawa won the 2017 6 Hours of Silverstone.
It’s the best performance we’ve seen from the 26-year-old from Yokohama since he switched from single-seaters, and if he continues to put in performances like this, we could look back to the 2025 Lone Star Le Mans as the day Marino Sato began to assert himself as a top GT driver on the international level…
AloJapan.com