Did you know that Kobayashi refused to take the podium in Spa as the team would not allow his car to win? Alonso is world class, no argument there, but you don't take two and a half minutes out of an identical car with no weak link in it other than Lopez (who I don't personally think is good enough) unless there is an amateur in the car. This was set up for Alonso to win from the start. You don't agree I know, but that's that as far as I'm concerned. It's not a slight on Alonso, he is almost as good as he thinks he is.
I didn't follow the Spa WEC race at the time so I don't know what happened there (assuming it was a team orders situation? I don't like that).
Regardless, I don't think Lopez was being slow, it was Alonso being fast. And being fast lap after lap, for almost 3 hours. And during the night.
I have seen, in the past, some amazing night drives of recoveries that would take hours (Tom Kristensen was famous for one of them, can't recall the year), and this one is right up there with those.
Yeah, it was an impressive drive and it needed an experienced driver to pull it off, but it wasn't a pressured performance, was it? The only competition was from his team mate. Versus some of the drives in recent years where you had the lead pack separated by a handful of seconds and chasing each other through the night. A good performance? Yes. A classic? Not even close.
I don't know if you are implying that fighting the teams other car is not as impressive as fighting another team. But if you are, I will both agree and disagree.
I agree with you because for the spectacle and us fans, to see a Toyota battle a Porsche, or a Peugeot battle a Audi, or (insert two makers here) do battle is always more nail biting.
But I disagree, because to fight the other car from your own team at Le Mans is, if you are trying to catch up, very risky business. Come the morning. odds are the team owner orders a cease fire and a procession to the end. So, Alonso's magnificente effort was a "do or die" one. If by morning the cars were still far apart, the #8 team risked being given orders. Quite understandably, Toyota wouldn't want the cars being pushed hard to the end, risking a double failure (Peugeot style, when all their cars plus the Oreca one burst into flames trying to catch the leading Audi).
PS - About how Alonso compares with all other TOYOTA drivers, and how Lopez had similar pace to them all (but Alonso), here's a graph I saw in the Autosport forums. The best 100 laps each of them made. Guess who the blue line represents? And check how Lopez compares with Nakajima.
PPS - I can't vouch for the accuracy of this graph, so please keep that grain of salt in your mind about what it shows ...
