The team won after the race was delayed by nearly two hours.
SPA-FRANCHORCHAMPS, Belgium—It has been over ten years since a duo won a World Endurance Championship race. Still, on a clear Saturday at this Belgian circuit, through a lengthy red-flag period, which led to an extra 44 minutes of racing, the Hertz JOTA team of Will Stevens and Calum Ilott fueled their car earlier, That gave the British team the lead after many of the front runners had not come in for final pit stops before the accident which delayed the race one hour and 44 minutes, which included Cadillac’s Earl Bamber and WRT BMW’s Sean Galael on the Kemmel straight with one hour to go.
Porsche Penske’s number six of Kevin Estre, Andre Lotterer, and Laurens Vanthoor took second after they had been up front for most of the race. A costly penalty early for the Ferrari number 50, which had a low amount of fuel following Friday’s hypercar session, had to have the team of Miguel Molina, Antonio Fuoco, and Nicklas Nielsen work their way up for most of the race, finally was well earned with taking third.
Ferrari’s sister car, number 51, finished in fourth, with the Proton Porsche, which had battled with the Penske Porsche number five before that entry crashed into Blanchement, finishing a deserving fifth. Sixth and seventh were the two Toyota Gazzo Racing cars, with the Number eight ahead of the number seven entry because of that car’s five-second time penalty caused by contact with an LMGT3 car.
Ferrari’s number 83 was eighth, and the final two top-ten cars were the two French manufacturers of the number 35 Alpine Endurance entry and the number 93 Total Energies Peugeot, which took the final championship point.
If the hypercar had a surprise winner with the best strategy, the LMGT3 competition was even more interesting as the two Manthey cars, the EMA and the Purerxcing entries, scored a 1-2 victory as Richard Lietz, Yassar Shahin, and Morris Schuring, who were in third place at the restart, had moved up to second when the Lynx Lamborghini led by Franck Perera had come in for a quick fuel stop. Lietz then had to battle his compatriot Klaus Bachler in the other Manthey Porsche, and with Bachler’s fuel running low, Lietz managed to pass at Les Combes and took the win by only just over a second.
Even after the quick pit stop did not have any issues with the Lynx Lamborghini, as the team was rewarded with a third-place finish. The Iron Dames team was fourth after leading the early part of the race, with the number 59 McLaren, who also was in the top three early on, ending up in fifth. The number 54 Vista Ferrari completed the top six in this category.
The next round of the championship will be the 24 Hours of Le Mans race, which will be held on June 15-16 in La Sathe, France.
