After qualifying for the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps, the second round of the FIA World Endurance Championship appeared wide open.
Could Peugeot back up its first pole with a maiden win? How would Cadillac’s alternative tyre strategy work out? May Alpine and Aston Martin deliver on their potential? Or maybe Ferrari or Toyota, the serial winners that they are, might find a way back into contention despite their lack of pace over one lap?
The answer was none of the above, as a strategic masterclass coupled with blistering pace saw BMW M Team WRT climb from 10th and 11th on the grid to claim an unlikely 1-2 finish with its pair of M Hybrid V8s.
The #20 of René Rast, Sheldon van der Linde and Robin Frijns secured victory after claiming track position by short fuelling at its opening pit stop, whilst the sister car of Kevin Magnussen, Raffaele Marciello and Dries Vanthoor successfully recovered from a mid-race spin for second.
The German marque’s maiden FIA WEC win means that in the last seven races, seven different Hypercar models from six manufacturers have won, with Ferrari (Le Mans), Cadillac (Interlagos), Porsche (CoTA), Alpine (Fuji) and Toyota (Bahrain and Imola) also having taken turns on the top step of the podium across the last 12 months.
The stage, therefore, seems well-set for next month’s 24 Hours of Le Mans, with Ferrari’s early-season domination of 2025 now a distant memory, and the form book giving all eight manufacturers reason to be optimistic entering the FIA WEC’s blue-riband event.
Some, of course, have left the opening two rounds of the season happier than others, but none, not even newcomer Genesis, have truly stood out as out of their depth in an increasingly mature Hypercar field.
The countdown to Le Mans is on, and there’s plenty of build-up to look forward to. But in the meantime, BMW’s smash and grab at Spa deserves to be celebrated and put into context. It has become the eighth manufacturer in the current era to win a WEC race outright, and now holds the lead in both the drivers’ and manufacturers’ World Championships.
It also finally has a major ACO sportscar overall victory to its name for the first time this century. You have to rewind all the way back to the 1999 running of the Le Mans 24 Hours and the V12 LMR program to find the proud manufacturer’s last triumph in this area of the sport.
It’s been quite the turnaround for the Bavarian brand, which has struggled to consistently make an impact with its Dallara-based M Hybrid V8. It’s not hard to argue that this result feels like it has come at a time when BMW needed it most.
Following a pair of podium finishes in the IMSA Sportscar Championship, including at the Rolex 24 at Daytona, this victory is the latest and most significant step for the overhauled effort, which has utilised one of its EVO ‘Jokers’, and introduced WRT as its IMSA service provider, over the off-season.
“A victory is always sweet, especially in a world championship that is so hard in terms of competition,” Andreas Roos, head of BMW M Motorsport, told DSC post-race.
“It was a sad week for us last week because of the news of Alex [Zanardi]’s passing. He would have loved to see us winning here. But we are super happy to have this victory in the pocket. We kept working, we worked hard, we brought the evo update, which started with a P3 in Daytona, we got a P3 in Laguna and now a 1-2 this weekend. It feels good right now.
“All six of our drivers need to be thanked, too. We went for an aggressive split strategy, and all our drivers in the #20 BMW were able to produce the lap times. It was amazing teamwork all the way, especially at the end when Kevin [Magnussen] was defending. The Ferrari with [Antonio] Fuoco in had newer tyres, Kevin had a double stint on his tyres, and of course, he pulled out all the stops to keep him behind.”
The decision to go off-strategy, a play all too reminiscent of the strategic nous with which WRT forged into reputation in GT World Challenge Europe in the 2010s, was no spur-of-the-moment, panic call by the Belgian team. Instead, Rast revealed post-race, it was presented beforehand, in case the BMWs found themselves remaining stuck in the middle of the Hypercar pack.
“It was on the table before the race,” Rast confirmed.
“We were not sure which car would take that gamble. In the end, it was a gamble, I was the lucky one to get that strategy, which brought us to the win today. It’s down to the team, because before the race we knew that this strategy, if everything works in our favour, could actually pay off.”
As with the rest of the 35-car FIA WEC field, as well as the 27 additional entries which will join them next month, BMW M Team WRT’s attention now turns to Le Mans.
With momentum now firmly on its side, the German-flagged, Belgian-run operation can start to believe that this Spa success will be looked back upon as a step towards greater things, as well as a momentous occasion in its own right.
“It will boost the whole team for the [Le Mans] preparation,” said WRT’s Vincent Vosse. “In the next two weeks, it’s going to be very hard work. We are testing next week, and the guys can never relax.”
Despite the win, Vosse isn’t getting carried away with himself, with the team’s dramatic debut in 2021 still etched into his memory.
“You’re never confident going to Le Mans,” he admitted. “It’s a 24 hour race, and it’s in Le Mans, so it’s one of the only tracks where you cannot test and where everything is possible, as we saw in ’21 when we had our two LMP2 cars leading in the last lap and losing a car in the last lap. Everything can happen in Le Mans, so let’s go to Le Mans fully charged, and see what we can do there.”
This mindset, however, has not necessarily transitioned over to his drivers, with van der Linde buoyed by their winning performance in the Ardennes.
“I absolutely think we can dream of something special at Le Mans now,” the South African told DSC.
“We want to win it more than a championship. Winning a race was the first target; now it’s the big one. Whether we’ll have the same car in a few weeks remains to be seen, but we’ve definitely taken a step forward with the 2026 car with race pace, so if we can start closer to the front at that one, it could be a great weekend.”
Images courtesy of BMW M Motorsport and Andrew Lofthouse
