United Autosports’ #22 ORECA of Oliver Jarvis, Marino Sato and Phil Hanson claimed a second consecutive race win to finish the 2023 ELMS season in the 4 Hours of Portimao today, but it was Algarve Pro Racing’s #25 crew that claimed the LMP2 titles.
A second-place finish from Alex Lynn, James Allen and Kyffin Simpson was more than enough to comfortably take the LMP2 class Teams and Drivers championships. It was a composed drive from all three but particularly from Lynn in the closing stages with the pressure mounting.
The result marks the first European Le Mans Series title for the multiple Asian Le Mans title-winning team and reigning IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup LMP2 champions. It is also the first ELMS LMP2 title for all three drivers.
United Autosports ended up second in the LMP2 standings with its #22 crew 13 points adrift, but will still receive a Le Mans invitation for finishing the season in the runner-up spot.
In the other classes, AF Corse hung on to win in LMP2 Pro/Am, clinching the Teams and Drivers titles in the process after a near-perfect performance from Francois Perrodo, Matthieu Vaxiviere and Ben Barnicoat at the end, who had to fend off a hard-charging Malthe Jakobsen in the final hour.
It was essentially a straight fight for the LMP2 Pro/Am crown in this one, with dramas for both COOL Racing’s #47 and Racing Team Turkey’s #34 crews costing them dearly in pursuit of the title.
Eurointernational scored an impressive LMP3 class win with its #11 Ligier, and Proton Competition’s #16 Porsche 911 RSR 19 took the final-ever ELMS GTE race win and titles with a confident run to the flag from Zach Robichon, Ryan Hardwick and Alessio Picariello.
The 2023 ELMS finale was a memorable one for so many reasons, not least because the race start was delayed significantly due to the torrential, relentless rain showers throughout the morning and early afternoon before being red-flagged for 45 minutes after a brief two-lap safety car start.
After hours of heavy rain, it looked highly unlikely that the race would get underway. But the conditions improved remarkably quickly during the afternoon and allowed for three hours of action-packed racing.
For United up front, it was a case of building a lead early and holding on late. Phil Hanson took the start and when the race finally went green with three hours on the clock after the second safety car, and quickly took the lead before building a comfortable gap.
United’s winning car would go almost entirely unchallenged until the end of the race, earning its third win in four races. After an hour of racing the lead gap was over a minute, but was reduced to 5.7 seconds at the end of the race, as Jarvis successfully navigated the messy final hour which was littered with incidents, yellow flags and FCYs.
“It was challenging at the beginning but I did my job. I pulled a decent-size gap, then my teammates did a good job of bringing it home. Olly did a good job to bring it home on a drying track on slicks,” a delighted Hanson said after the race.
Behind, the LMP2 champions in the #25 Algarve Pro Racing ORECA finished second after multiple podium contenders fell by the wayside.
Until the final half hour, it looked like the pole-sitting IDEC Sport ORECA would take second but Paul-Loup Chatin was one of many drivers who got caught out by the greasy conditions and ended up up in the gravel. This saw him fall off the lead lap and outside the top 10. The #30 Duqueine ORECA that inherited second was then handed a drive-through for contact with the Panis Racing ORECA at Turn 8, which dropped it to 10th overall.
This left the door open for Alex Lynn and Job Van Uitert in the title-contending Panis Racing ORECA to fight for second. Lynn told DSC afterwards he did consider letting Van Uitert go, as finishing behind the #65 would have made no difference to the points standings. However, the allure of a second-place finish was too strong and he opted to focus on delivering the strongest result possible and defended the position hard.
“It’s the way we’re built,” he said.
In the end, Lynn held on, though the decision to fight almost backfired when Van Uitert made an optimistic dive up the inside at Turn 5 with just minutes remaining, hitting the side of Lynn’s ORECA. The impact sent the Panis 07 into a spin but mercifully did no major damage to either car and the pair continued, finishing less than a second apart.
The Pro/Am title-winning AF Corse ORECA took fourth, after Ben Barnicoat’s late race heroics holding off a hard-charging Malthe Jakobsen in the #37 COOL ORECA by just 0.6 of a second at the line.
After the final round of stops, Jakobsen was five seconds behind Barnicoat, having already taken big chunks out of the lead in his first set of laps upon getting in the car. But his chance of going head-to-head for the title was ultimately thwarted when Jose Maria Lopez in the sister LMP2 class COOL ORECA ended up in the gravel with seven minutes remaining, bringing out an FCY which lasted until there was just one minute on the clock
The team will leave wondering what could have been had Alex Coigny not dropped to the back of the pack after a spin at Turn 5 after the race went green, costing the team a huge amount of time and track position. It will also ponder how many more laps Jakobsen would have needed to make a move at the end.
Ben Hanley crossed the line third to hand Nielsen Racing a podium in the #24 ORECA, a second ahead of the Racing Team Turkey ORECA that was recovering from three significant setbacks.
The first was a spin for Salih Yoluc after the start. The second was a moment in the pit lane which ended with Yoluc hitting one of his own mechanics after a GT car blocked him from reaching his pit box at the correct angle (the mechanic is fine).
The final drama came shortly after Charlie Eastwood climbed aboard with just over two hours remaining. The Irishman was hit hard from behind by the JMW Ferrari of Martin Berry at Turn 5, costing him precious time while stuck and unable to rejoin.
This left Louis Deletraz with a mountain to climb. Sitting ninth in the final hour, he was tasked with reducing a deficit of almost 40 seconds in the closing laps. He pushed hard and made progress but even after the final safety car there wasn’t enough time for him for a comeback.
Having been the class of the Pro/Am field all season, and capable of challenging for an overall title, Racing Team Turkey and its drivers endured a hugely disappointing end to the season, its championship challenges falling apart at the final set of hurdles.
The race in LMP3 wasn’t thrilling, but it was certainly eventful. This was Ultimate’s race to lose for a long time, but it all unravelled for Jean-Baptise Lahaye late in the race after contact with the #7 Nielsen Ligier saw the team handed a penalty, before the car eventually retired from the lead with mechanical troubles in the final hour.
Eutointernational went on to claim the win, finishing eight seconds clear of the newly-crowned champions in the #17 COOL Racing Ligier. DKR’s #4 Duqueine completed the podium, ahead of the #13 Inter Europol Ligier missed out on a podium after serving its final long stop late in the race.
In GTE, Proton’s #16 Porsche crew of Zach Robichon, Alessio Picariello and Ryan Hardwick capped off their strong performances throughout the season with a race win that would ensure they comfortably claimed the final ELMS GTE championship.
Early in the day, the rain had many trackside believing that the final ever GTE race in Europe would be a non-event. Thankfully, when the conditions improved there were fireworks at various points in the class, with multiple door-to-door battles.
The #16 crew are worthy champions and have delivered a fourth ELMS GTE title for the German Proton Competition team. Second on the road was the #51 AF Corse Ferrari which with Ulysses De Pauw installed at the end kept Picariello honest until the checkered flag.
Adding to Proton’s successes was a third-place finish for the #77 that won on Friday night, making it a double podium for Porsche and Christian Reid’s hard-working outfit.
The #50 Formula Racing Ferrari had a quiet run to fourth, ahead of the #55 AF Corse 488 which was strong throughout and early in the race was in contention for the win during what was easily Duncan Cameron’s most impressive stint of the season, in the toughest conditions.
It was another race to forget this season for the Aston Martin teams. The #44 of GMB Motorsport finished highest, but sixth in class after another messy outing for the Danish squad.
However, the GTE result changed significantly post-race. There were three-time penalties imposed for drive-time infringements, affecting the #44 GMB Motorsport Aston Martin, #51 AF Corse Ferrari and #50 Formula Racing Ferrari. That left the #44 fifth, remarkably better placed than before due to the penalties being harsher for the other two cars.
Formula Racing is reclassified ninth from its original fourth-place finish and the #51 loses its second-place podium finish and was classified seventh. That leaves the final podium as a Proton 1-2 with the #16 ahead of the #77, with the #55 Spirit of Race Ferrari third. JMW’s 488 GTE ended up fourth
With the 2023 season over, the focus shifts to the Rookie Test at Portimao tomorrow, which will see 22 cars return to the circuit before the winter break.
