Panis Overcomes Penalty to Win 4H Barcelona
Photo: Laurent Cartalade/MPS Agency.
Reigning European Le Mans Series champions Forestier Racing by Panis overcame 20 seconds of time penalties to win Sunday’s 4 Hours of Barcelona.
The French team continued its winning ways when Esteban Masson took the No. 29 Oreca 07 Gibson that he shared with Oliver Gray and Louis Rousset across the line 13.398 seconds ahead of Reshad De Gerus in the No. 34 Inter Europol Competition machine.
Masson pinched the lead from the pole-sitting Inter Europol car in the final ten minutes of the race.
The Panis entry bounced back from two separate ten-second penalties served in the second hour when Rousset was at the wheel, the first for overtaking off-track and having a lasting advantage and the other for disrespecting race director’s instructions.
Masson, who was in the car at the time of serving the penalties, dropped back to fourth at the end of the second hour but rallied back to the lead shortly after.
De Gerus, meanwhile, brought home the Polish squad’s No. 34 car that he shared with Bijoy Garg in second place. The pair were the only two-driver squad in the race, a strategy that almost netted them victory.
The No. 22 United Autosports entry completed the podium. The team was propelled into the battle for the lead after a rapid opening stint from Griffin Peebles brought the car up from sixth into the podium places.
IDEC Sport’s No. 18 entry took fourth place with newly-minted Genesis Magma Racing Trajectory drivers Laurents Hörr and Valerio Rinicella joining Jamie Chadwick in her second year of European Le Mans competition.
Former Alpine Formula 1 driver Jack Doohan had contact with the No. 22 car in an overtake for the podium. His Nielsen Racing car was on track for a second-place result before suspected suspension failure in the final moments of the race dropped them to seventh place.
The opening lap of the race was marred by a red flag after a six-car pile-up across both the LMP2 and LMP3 classes.
The race time was extended by 25 minutes to compensate for the time lost in the red flag.
De Gerus led the race after the restart but eventually relinquished control of the field to Peebles in the United car and Panis driver Gray.
In LMP2 Pro-Am, Malthe Jakobsen took the No. 20 Algarve Pro Racing car that he drives alongside Michale Jensen and Enzo Trulli to class victory ahead of the No. 83 AF Corse entry.
Class pole-scorers Duqueine Team rounded out the Pro-Am podium.
Giorgio Roda led the field for much of the race in a tense dice with AO by TF’s No. 99 Oreca. However, repeated caution periods chipped away at its lead until it was within striking distance of the Algarve Pro squad.
Proton Triumphs in Tight LMGT3 Battle; Rinaldi Win in LMP3
Proton Competition scored victory in its No. 75 Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo ahead of United Autosports’ McLaren 720S GT3 Evo.
The Proton Porsche was engaged in a tight battle with the leading No. 62 Team Qatar by Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo for much of the second half of the race, before a move from Porsche Motorsport North America Selected Driver Tom Sargent finally secured the class win.
It came in both Sargent and FIA Bronze-rated driver Matt Kurzejewski’s ELMS debuts, in a car they shared with Porsche factory veteran Richard Lietz.
Kessel Racing’s No. 57 Ferrari 296 GT3 Evo just completed the final spot on the podium from the No. 62 Mercedes-AMG in the final minutes of the race.
Rinaldi Racing drivers José Fernandes Cautela, Alvise Rodella and Mikkel Gaarde Pedersen took top honors in the LMP3 class in their No. 5 Ligier JS P325 Toyota ahead of class pole-sitters R-ace GP.
Inter Europol Competition’s No. 13 Ligier scored a surprise third place after a one-minute penalty for the No. 11 Eurointernational car dropped it back to fourth place.
RESULTS: 4 Hours of Barcelona
Source: Sports Car 365