The third hour of the 2017 Spa 24 opened under the safety car, with the #14 Emil Frey Jaguar anomalously in the lead after failing to follow the rest of the field through the pitlane to avoid the debris from Lathouras’ accident at Eau Rouge.
The car was subsequently black-flagged for the misdemeanour, but the genuine leader, the #8 Bentley, pitted immediately when the safety car came in, handing P1 back to the #63 Lamborghini, now with Andrea Caldarelli behind the wheel.
Further drive-through penalties were handed out, to the #911 Herberth Porsche for a pitstop time violation and the #11 Kessel Ferrari for track limits.
Calado sat second, just 0.5 seconds behind Caldarelli, with Nico Muller third in the #1 Audi, but the race was neutralised with a safety car once again following an off for Jamie Green in the #17 WRT Audi on the approach to ‘no-name’ corner, the car left with front and rear-end damage and seemingly a retirement on the spot.
Behind the top three were Perera in the #84 HTP Mercedes, Marciello in the #90 AKKA Mercedes, Vervisch in the #2 WRT Audi and Vanthoor in the #117 Team75 Porsche.
There were drive-through penalties for Am Cup runners the #11 Kessel Ferrari and #36 Walkenhorst BMW, as well as the lone Cup-class Porsche, for having pitstops within the prohibited time range.
Calado continued to shadow Caldarelli closely at the head of the field, but couldn’t quite find a way past. As the third hour wound down, the top 10 were covered by around 15 seconds, having spread out slightly since the safety car was called in.
Caldarelli pitted after only a 20-lap stint, compared to 26 laps for the second part of Bortolotti’s double and Calado in the Ferrari followed suit a lap later. The Kaspersky car then emerged a few seconds in front of the Lamborghini at pit exit.
Christian Klien nerfed the barriers nose-on at Les Combes in the #114 Jaguar a short way into the fourth hour of the race. The car looked surprisingly undamaged, but ground to a halt only a few metres further down the track.
There was blow for the chances of the #117 Team75 Porsche, currently with Kevin Estre at the wheel, in the form of a three-minute stop-go penalty for an unsafe pit entry after Christensen had accidentally hit the next team’s lollipop man on the previous stop. Also falling foul of the regulations was the #8 Bentley, which was slapped with a drive-through for exceeding driver stint time – but the penalty was subsequently suspended.
The #58 McLaren then stopped out on track with Ben Barnicoat at the wheel on the run down to Rivage – the team reporting an oil pressure issue. Up front, Calado continued to extend the margin between himself and Caldarelli to the tune of seven tenths a lap.
There were further drive-through penalties for the #888 Kessel Ferrari (David Perel) for track-limits violation and also for the #7 Bentley (Smith), #19 Grasser Lamborghini (Perez Companc), #3 WRT Audi (Venter) and #99 ROWE BMW (Martin), #75 ISR Audi (Schmid). The only one of these in the top 10 was Schmid.
Dries Vanthoor in the #5 WRT Audi had a long pit stop to repair a damaged brake disc; Andre Lotterer took the car back out after over eight minutes in the pits for his first turn behind the wheel. The car had dropped from eighth to 46th in the overall standings in the interim.
