WEC Title-Clinching Scenarios for Porsche, Toyota, Ferrari

While the No. 6 Porsche Penske Motorsport has a stranglehold on the Drivers' championship in the WEC, the manufacturers' title race is still very much up for grabs between the trio of Porsche, Ferrari and Toyota. 

Due to their stellar performance thus far with only Bahrain left to go, Porsche find themselves top of the table as we inch closer to the season finale on November 2. Three wins and five total podiums have plopped them atop the perch with 161 points to their name, while Toyota are just 10 points behind and Ferrari will be looking to pull off the upset if enough things go their way out in the desert. 

Now remember, Bahrain is an eight hour race, meaning the points payout is higher than a regular six hour enduro, and because of that it gives Toyota and Ferrari a bit more wiggle room to out-punch Porsche and fight their way to the top of the standings when all is said and done.

Some other things to point out before we run through the scenarios - 

- Things are more straightforward for Porsche and Toyota compared to Ferrari, who have a super-slim chance to pull off the miracle yet they're not mathematically eliminated. For them to have a chance going into the race they have to win Hyperpole and secure that crucial extra point.

- The placement finishes listed out for each car is related to the other factory programs, *not* the customer programs on the grid (we're looking at you, Hertz Team Jota, Proton, and AF Corse).

- We'll keep these scenarios as simple as we can without getting into the myriad of situations where if Team X finishes in 3rd and Team Y finishes in 5th what happens then, etc. etc. We're going to highlight on what is in control of each program for them to come out on top.

Before we dive in, is all of the math here correct? We sure hope so. Is there room for any of these permutations to be entirely bunk because we got some of the numbers wrong? You betcha. If you check our numbers and something is off let us know with a comment below. 

Easiest Title Clinching Scenario without Hyperpole: Porsche P1 OR Toyota P1 - 

If either Porsche or Toyota finish P1, they'll win the championship. If there's a 1/2 finish in favor of Porsche, they come out on top with 199 points vs. 178. If Toyota pull off the race victory and PPM finish P2, the standings would flip where TGR wins the world title by just a single point - 189 vs. 188. Now, where could a single point be found for either team..?

With Hyperpole (and tiebreaker):

If Toyota wins the race but *does not* secure the Hyperpole point, they finish with 189 points. If Porsche finish in P2 and *do* win Hyperpole, they'll also finish with 189 points - yet the world title would go to Toyota by virtue of the first tie-breaker, which is total victories on the year (four to three).

Porsche Scenarios: Finish no worse than 4th AND Toyota finish 3rd or worse

If Porsche don't win the race, they can't fall further than P4, as a fourth-place finish coupled with a Toyota P3 or worse would leave the points totals at 179 vs. 174. 

Toyota Scenarios: P2/Porsche finish 5th or worse - OR - P6 or better AND Porsche outside top 10/DNF

Again, an overall race win clinches the title for TGR no matter what the Porsche's do. However, if TGR doesn't claim victory, their next-best maximum point total can settle at 179 (P2 + Hyperpole). In that case Porsche has to finish 5th or worse, which would yield them a maximum of 176 points.

If the absolute nightmare scenario happens for Porsche and both the No. 5 and No. 6 fail to score any points at all, either by finishing outside the top 10 or by crashing out/a race retirement, Toyota would then only have to score at least a 6th place finish, which would settle the point totals at 163 vs. 161. It has to be 6th or better for Toyota AND the Porsche double DNF because a 10th place finish for Porsche would leave the two teams tied at 163 points, and with the first tie-breaker for wins tied at three a piece, the second tie-breaker would come into effect which is most second-place finishes, which Porsche has over Toyota (two to one). Imagine if that actually happened? Wild.

Ferrari Scenarios: Hyperpole victory/P1/Porsche finish 7th or worse/Toyota finish 4th or worse - OR - Hyperpole victory/P2/Porsche both DNF/Toyota finish 7th or worse

Did you get all that?

Ferrari need a bit more to break their way if they're to steal away the world title. They need the maximum points possible to have a realistic shot at things, which is as follows -  a Hyperpole victory and an overall race win, which would yeild 173 points. From there, to avoid tiebreakers, Ferrari need the Penske Porsche's to finish 7th or worse (170) while also needing TGR to finish 4th or worse (169).

If Ferrari were to finish P2 (and still win Hyperpole) their point total would settle at 162. In that scenario, BOTH Porsche Penske's would have to finish outside the points/DNF, while both TGRs would have to finish 7th or worse (160 points). Now, is that likely? Not at all, but crazier things have happened when it comes to this grand sport of endurance racing. What if these guys go into Turn 1 and those four Hypercars all clip each other across the front and break some mechanical bits throughout the car? You then have to limp around the track before slowly crawling back into pit lane as the crew finally gets to work on fixing this and that, and before you know it you're already 5 laps down and there's still 7 hours and 40 minutes remaining on the clock. There'd be a lot of tight buttholes up and down pit lane. 

So there you have it, the title-clinching scenarios for the three racing outfits that still have a shot at glory. Did we get all of that correct? Again, we sure hope so. 

Who do you have winning it all in two weeks time? Let us know below. 

(photo via weclemans24.com)