AO by TF #14 ORECA scored its first win of the 2024 ELMS season in today’s 4 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps. Jonny Edgar, Robert Kubica and Louis Deletraz now lead the LMP2 championship with two rounds remaining after a faultless performance in a race that featured its fair share of drama in each class.
The first half of the race picked up where the Le Mans Cup support on Saturday night left off, with three safety cars called in two hours for a number of incidents up and down the field.
It made for a frustrating watch but did keep the field bunched up for the second half when the Bronze drivers in each class had completed their drive time and the race ran green. It made for a thrilling run to the flag.
When the race found its rhythm in the third hour, it essentially became a three-way fight for the overall lead between the eventual winners and the #43 Inter Europol and #37 COOL Racing ORECAs.
It didn’t quite come to blows for the lead in the final stint, as Deletraz was able to keep Inter Europol’s Tom Dillmann at bay, but it was tense when the Swiss’ advantage shrank with time expiring.
“We would have wanted to win earlier, it was a difficult start to the season but we have a P3, P2 and now P1,” Deletraz said after the race. “It was really difficult at the end, Tom had pace and I lost time to traffic in the final laps.”
Dillmann eventually finished 1.1 seconds behind as Malthe Jakobsen in the #37 COOL 07 lost time to a pit stop time penalty for track limits and ended up falling to fifth in the final 10 minutes after struggling for pace. IDEC’s Job van Uitert and Luca Ghiotto in the sister Inter Europol ORECA charged past the Dane who was clearly lacking tyre performance.
It briefly looked like Jakobsen would have to settle for sixth as Charles Milesi also found a way through while fighting with van Uitert, but the Frenchman’s pace fell off a cliff with a few minutes remaining too, the Panis ORECA quickly sliding from third to sixth.
LMP2 Pro/Am was won by the #83 AF Corse ORECA of Francois Perrodo, Alessio Rovera and Matthieu Vaxiviere. With a commanding performance, the trio retook the lead in the class title race from the TDS Racing crew who started from pole but didn’t make the finish, crashing out in the second hour.
“We have built a strong lead (of 20 points) now, hopefully we can convert the try in Mugello,” Perrodo said post-race.
Proton Competition’s #77 ORECA took second, ahead of the #20 Algarve Pro Racing ORECA which looked on course to take the runner up spot before a drive-through for a track limits violation was dolled out by race control with 26 minutes remaining.
The Nielsen Racing ORECA which led early during John Falb’s stint took fourth, with the #3 DKR ORECA completing the top five.
LMP3 was won by Eurointernational and its driver pairing of Adam Ali and Matthew Richard Bell, who extended their championship lead to 14 points with a second win in two races. The pair did well to extract a strong result, recovering from contact at Les Combes that saw them stuck in the gravel early in the race.
“That was really tough,” Ali said. “I made my way to second, got tagged, ended up in the gravel and dropped to 10th. But the strategy was perfect, it put us back in the running for a win. I can’t believe we went from the front to the back to the front again!”
Behind, Racing Spirit of Leman took second, its Ligier 14 seconds back. Third place meanwhile, was taken by the #17 COOL Racing JS P320 after DKR’s Duqueine spun and stalled at the Bus Stop on the final lap. It was agonising for Wyatt Brichacek, who struggled to get the car re-fired and dropped to seventh.
The RLR M Sport Ligier that took Pole rose to fourth at the final corner, benefitting from DKR’s misfortune and Ultimate nabbed fifth.
Kessel Racing claimed a dominant victory in LMGT3 and led home a Ferrari 1-2-3. Its #57 296 of Takeshi Kimura, Esteban Masson and Daniel Serra enjoyed a fault-free, speedy run to the line.
The Swiss team took control in the third hour when Masson stormed past Grid Motorsport’s Johnny Adam and Racing Spirit Of Leman’s Casper Stevenson to move from third to the lead at Les Combes and La Source respectively.
From there it was a relatively simple run to the flag, Daniel Serra finishing the job in the final half hour, crossing the line 20 seconds clear of the rest of the field. Win number one for the team is a crucial one as it puts it in title contention with two races to go.
“Esteban, what can you say?” Serra commented. “You’re going to hear a lot more about him in the future because he’s got a lot of talent. I didn’t have to do much at the end as we were in the lead when I got in!”
Second by the end was the GR Racing Ferrari, which like Kessel’s earned a strong finish by running a clean, steady race.
Like LMP3, there was late drama in the fight for third place in the class. Proton’s #60 Porsche held the position with Julien Andlauer in at the end but slowed with a puncture and fell to sixth. Grid Motorsport’s Aston Martin looked poised to finish on the podium as a result, but it too hit trouble in the form of a drive-through which dropped it to fifth.
Racing Spirit of Leman’s Vantage AMR LMGT3 EVO was next in line to take the place, but Valentin Hasse Clot couldn’t keep Nico Varrone at bay. The Argentinian came out of nowhere in the #51 AF Corse Ferrari, storming to third from sixth, sealing the top three spot with a move on the RSL Aston at La Source to complete the ‘Prancing Horse’ podium sweep.
One of the key stories of the race in LMGT3,was the level of attrition, as five of the 11 cars failed to make the finish, including the pole-sitting, championship-leading, Iron Lynx Lamborghini and Iron Dames Porsche that won last time out in Imola.
For Iron Lynx, its race unravelled in Hour 2 while Hiroshi Hamaguchi was leading. His race came to an abrupt end after he was turned around at La Source by Carl Bennett in the #47 COOL ORECA following a safety car, then hit from behind by the Iron Dames Porsche of Sarah Bovy while passing through Eau Rouge.
Hamaguchi suffered understeer at turn-in, taking Bovy – who was closing in fast because of Hamaguchi’s slow run down the hill – by surprise.
The damage from the front-right, left-rear contact sent both cars into retirement. Notably, it was the second incident involving the two cars, as in the first hour Bovy hit the rear of Hamaguchi while trying to take the lead.
That clash led to a multi-car incident at Les Combes, as it unsettled Bovy’s 911, sending her into the side of Spirit of Race’s Matt Griffin who was on the outside. Bovy’s spin across the track and onto the grass then sent Formula Racing’s Johnny Laursen off into the barriers in avoidance.
“I was on the outside and I had loads of space,” a disgruntled Griffin said on ELMS TV after the incident, which forced the #55 crew into retirement. “I’ve looked at the onboard and it seems she’s hit the Lambo, had an oversteer moment and basically took me out of the race.
“It’s ridiculous driving. She’s taken me out and Johnny too while she was spinning. They’ve destroyed our team, and for what? She just needed to say ‘Matt’s passed me’ and just chill and get me back at another corner.”
It was a bad end to a tough week for Iron Dames and Iron Lynx, which began with sudden passing of its driver coach Luca Persiani before the race meeting. Iron Lynx, which led the points standings ahead of the race, missed out on a victory again and stays winless, while Iron Dames now has two retirements in four races.
Formula Racing, like Iron Dames, continued after the Les Combes tangle but later retired. The Danish-flagged Ferrari’s day was done when Laursen and TDS Racing’s Gregoire Saucy came together at Eau Rouge in Hour 2 during the restart following the Hamaguchi-Bovy incident at the same corner.
JMW’s Ferrari also suffered an early exit when John Hartshorne came together with Vector’s ORECA at Pouhon in the opening laps, sending him spearing into the side of the #25 APR ORECA and into the concrete wall on driver’s left. Thankfully, he walked away.
Next up is the ELMS’ second trip of the year to Italy for the 4 Hours of Mugello on September 29th.
Images courtesy of ELMS
