Jamie Chadwick, Daniel Juncadella and Mathys Jaubert’s fairytale start to the 2025 ELMS season continued this afternoon in a highly entertaining wet-dry four-hour race at Paul Ricard. The trio combined to claim the win in the Genesis Magma Racing-backed #18 IDEC Sport ORECA.
After winning the LMP2 class with a second-place overall finish in Barcelona, this time they went one better and took a narrow overall and LMP2 class victory in tricky conditions. It was a near faultless performance from the three of them, the only setback being an off on lap 1 in the greasy conditions for Chadwick, which dropped the car from fourth to 11th.
Chadwick, and later Juncadella and Jaubert, kept it clean thereafter, as the track went from greasy, to full wet, to dry, and tyre choice, pit strategy and safety car restarts played a key part in the outcome.
Chadwick recovered to sixth and Juncadella carried on climbing the standings before handing the baton to Jaubert, who was tasked with soaking up late pressure again.
“It was one of those race where there was a lot of mistakes going on, lucky moments in changing conditions. But the team played a role. It wasn’t a pace race, we just stayed out of trouble,” Juncadella said.
“After Barcelona to win again is unexpected, but it’s a great result for the team,” added Chadwick, after becoming the first female driver to win an ELMS race overall.
The winning margin was narrow, with just 1.8 seconds separating Jaubert and a hard-charging James Allen for Nielsen Racing behind. It looked like a re-run of the season opener was on the cards with time winding down, as Allen, who helped Nielsen score an emphatic LMP2 Pro/Am win, reeled in the #18 for the lead.
But on this occasion, the Genesis Trajectory Programme driver held on in the closing laps, putting in another head-turning performance to extend the #18 crew’s championship lead to 23 points.
“That was a lot easier than Barcelona!” Jaubert admitted to DSC. “But it’s still a big result for us and the IDEC team on its 10th anniversary.”
Allen, who admitted post-race that he didn’t realise the #18 ahead was leading, bookended a hugely impressive performance for Nielsen Racing’s #27 crew.
The team nailed the tyre choice for the start, putting Tony Wells on wets when most of the LMP2 runners opted for slicks. “It helps being British sometimes,” Wells quipped.
It laid the foundation for a team’s first ELMS LMP2 Pro/Am win. Wells stormed to the front and, through Sergio Sette Camara and James Allen’s stints, the team remained in the hunt to the end.
To seal it, Allen had to keep an eye on his mirrors and monitor the progress of the AO by TF ORECA in the final 10 minutes. “It was really stressful in the car,” he said. “But I need to point out that this win was possible because my teammates did so well, despite having not driven the car in the wet before.”
Louis Deletraz made it two LMP2 Pro/Am ORECAs in the top three with an impressive final stint aboard ‘Spike the LMP2 Dragon’. The Swiss found a way past Mathias Beche’s TDS ORECA and eventually Marino Sato’s #21 United Autosports ORECA at the Mistral Chicane to take second.
The class pole-sitters (Deletraz, PJ Hyett and Dane Cameron) didn’t quite achieve the breakthrough result they targeted, but it was undeniably a strong performance. Crucially, they secured 18 points on a day which saw the Barcelona-winning AF Corse ORECA hit trouble and finish at the bottom of the timing screens.
After starting 21st and last in class due to Francois Perrodo’s absence from Qualifying, the #83 ended up getting involved in a heavy shunt at the start, which brought out the first safety car.
Perrodo, struggling in the tricky wet conditions, looped the car at the end of the lap and was ploughed into hard, head-on, by the #8 Team Virage Ligier of Jacek Zielonka. The hit damaged the Ligier beyond repair and forced the Zebra-patterned prototype into the garage.
The team rejoined the race nine laps down after a 24-minute stop and eventually finished 37th overall.
TDS Racing’s ORECA completed the Pro/Am class podium, after Sato required a late splash, which dropped the #21 to fifth behind the Proton Competition 07, which led the class before being dealt a drive-through in the third hour.
The LMP2 podium, meanwhile, featured the #43 pole-winning Inter Europol Competition ORECA and the #47 CLX Motorsport example with fourth and eighth place overall finishes, respectively.
Vector Sport followed up its podium in Spa with a fine fourth that has seen Gary Holland’s team move up to second in the standings. A dark horse for the title? The British team certainly hopes so.
Two cars retired in LMP2. The first was the #37 CLX Pure Rxcing ORECA, which crashed out late in Hour 1. On his own, Alex Malykhin lost the rear on the exit of Signes and ended up hitting the barriers head-on. The car was an on-the-spot retirement and caused the second of three safety cars.
The Iron Lynx Proton ORECA also DNF’d, after leading a chunk of the race during Maceo Capietto’s stint. The car’s front-right wheel detached on Matteo Cairoli’s outlap. It forced him to pit the car for repairs to the hub in the third hour, which dropped the car to last in class and five laps down. It would eventually be withdrawn after further drama.
The #28 IDEC Sport ORECA, like the #37, also ended up in the barriers after contact with the #34 Inter Europol ORECA sent Job Van Uitert off track at Turn 7. It brought out the final safety car, which in turn set up a sprint to the end with 68 minutes on the clock. The #28 did finish, though, albeit 18th overall and 11th in LMP2.
Elsewhere, CLX Motorsport and Ligier’s dominance in the new turbo-powered LMP3 era continued. Paul Lanchere, Adrien Closmenil and Theodor Jensen were the class of the field once again in the #17 JS P325 Toyota en route to scoring yet another win for the Swiss outfit.
CLX has kicked off the 2025 season with two ELMS LMP3 wins and two Le Mans Cup wins and shows no sign of slowing down.
M Racing’s Ligier JS P325 took second and looked poised for a win until Closmenil made a late pass for the lead on Quentin Antonel with 40 minutes remaining.
Eurointernational’s Ligier made it a podium sweep for the French constructor, on a day in which Duqueine and Ginetta’s challenges faded.
WTM By Rinaldi’s D09 had the speed required to take a top-three finish but retired with a driveshaft failure. DKR Engineering’s Ginetta G61-LT-P325 Evo came home an encouraging fifth.
LMGT3 produced, as it often does, a thrilling finale with the top five cars finishing a handful of seconds apart.
Richard Mille AF Corse’s #50 Ferrari claimed the honours in LMGT3 via strong drives from Custodio Toledo, Riccardo Agostini and Lilou Wadoux.
Wadoux clung on to win on the final lap, staying mistake-free as Iron Lynx’s Fabian Schiller closed in on the #50’s rear bumper. With a second-place finish, Iron Lynx scored its first podium as a Mercedes-AMG partner team and looked like a title contender once again. How damaging will the retirement from Barcelona prove to be later in the season?
GR Racing made it onto the third step with a ballsy move from Riccardo Pera on Spirit of Race’s David Perel at the final corner. Fourth place will feel bittersweet for Perel, Duncan Cameron and Matt Griffin after Cameron built a huge lead in the first hour by starting on wet tyres.
Next up on the ELMS schedule is the 4 Hours of Imola on July 6th. Before that, though, many of the teams will travel to the Circuit de la Sarthe for the Le Mans 24 Hours next month.
Images courtesy of ELMS & Nielsen Racing
