Fernando Alonso surged to the head of the field during second practice for this weekend’s FIA World Endurance Championship 6 Hours of Fuji, finishing over a second clea༒r of Toyota teammate Joꩲse Maria Lopez.

McLaren Formula 1 racer Alonso returned to the wheel of his Le Mans-winning #8 Toyota TS050 Hybrid for the first time in six weeks on Friday at Fuji as co-driver Sebastien Buemi topped the timesh𓆏eet in the opening practice session.

Alonso managed to beat Buemi’s lap by almost two seconds in FP2, turning in a best time of 1m23.97▨3s as he went one second clear of the field.

Lopez was Alonso’s closest challenger, lapping 1.095 seconds slower to finish the sessio꧟n second in the #7 Toyota as the Japanese marque swept to another one-two finish.

Rebelliಌon Racing finished as the leading privateer team in LMP1 as Thomas Laurent took P𒀰3, 1.7 seconds back from Alonso’s benchmark. Jenson Button was fourth-quickest in LMP1 for SMP Racing.

Andre Negra🔯o managed to lead the way in LMP2 for Signatech Alpine Matmut after beating Jackie Chan DC Racing’s Ho-Pin Tung by four-tenths of a second. Weiron Tan was third in class in the sister DC Racing entry.

Aston Martin Racing rose to the head of the field in GTE-Pro thanks to Nicki Th♉iim in the #95 Aston Martin Vantage GTE. His lap of 1m37.659s saw him finish one-tenth of a second clear of Harry Tincknell in the #67 ✤Ford GT.

GTE-Am was led by Matteo Cairoli in the #88 Dempsey-Proton Racing Porsche 911 RSR, beating the team’s sister #77 Porsche by two-tenths of a second.
 
As in FP1, a🎀 red flag was required in second pra💮ctice at Fuji for track repairs, with two lengthy stoppages wiping around half an hour off the session running time.

Running will resume 🎶on Saturday♛ at Fuji with Free Practice 3 taking place at 9:30am local time (1:30am BST).