Spa ELMS: WRT wins to seal LMP2 title with a round to spare

Arriving into the penultimate round of the season, the #41 WRT crew held an 11-point advantage over their nearest rivals Roman Rusinov, Nyck de Vries and Franco Colapinto in the #26 G-Drive Aurus.

But with Rusinov having to retire the car early after being spun by the #34 Racing Team Turkey Oreca driven by Salih Yoluc at the opening turn, victory was sufficient for the WRT trio to put the title mathematically beyond reach for its rivals.

Formula 1 race winner Kubica took the start in the #41 WRT Oreca from third on the grid and was immediately up to second when Phil Hanson’s #22 United Autosports car suffered a puncture in the opening lap chaos.

When Yoluc went off at the gravel at Turn 5 and brought out the first FCY just 35 minutes into the race, the leading LMP2 crews took advantage of the situation to complete their pitstops. 

WRT elected to keep Kubica in the car for a second stint, which allowed the Polish driver to leapfrog the polesitting #37 Cool Racing Oreca now driven by Alexandre Coigny.

There was another lead change in the second round of pitstops, with the #32 United Autosports Oreca that had started last following a heavy crash for Nico Jamin in qualifying getting a jump on the erstwhile leading WRT.

But Yifei, now at the wheel of the #41 Oreca, was able to pass Manuel Maldonado going into Les Combes to put his team back in the lead of the race with just over two hours to run.

From there on the WRT crew cruised to the chequered flag, with Deletraz bringing the car home five seconds clear of the #30 Duqueine Oreca after an off for Christophe Cresp in the #5 MV2S Ligier JS P320 brought out a late FCY.

Having bagged 25 points in the race, Kubica, Yifei and Deletraz - who were cruelly robbed off a victory in the Le Mans 24 Hours last month - enjoy an unassailable 36-point lead heading into the final round of the season at Portimao in October.

The result further underlined the credentials of Belgian squad WRT in its first season in prototype machinery, after its full season FIA World Endurance Championship entry driven by Robin Frijns, Ferdinand Habsburg and Charles Milesi claimed the LMP2 class win at Le Mans in the team’s first appearance at the Circuit de la Sarthe.

Behind the #41 crew, Tristan Gommendy, Memo Rojas and Rene Binder finished second at Spa in the #30 Duqueine entry after Gommendy passed both Job van Uitert in the #32 United entry and James Allen’s #65 Panis Racing Oreca during his stint.

The final spot on the podium went to Allen, Will Stevens and Julien Canal's Panis entry.

The LMP2 Pro-Am battle is yet to be decided after Coigny, Milesi and Nicolas Lapierre finished fourth overall, three spots ahead of the class-leading #25 G-Drive Aurus, piloted at Spa by Rui Andrade, John Falb and Gustavo Menezes.

LMP3 honours went to Laurents Hoerr and Mathieu de Barbuat, the duo clinching a third consecutive class win for the #4 DKR Engineering squad to close the gap to #19 Cool Racing trio Matt Bell, Niklas Kruetten and Nicolas Maulini to just five points.

AF Corse took victory in the GTE class, with Alessio Rovera, Francois Perrodo and Emmanuel Collard beating the similar Ferrari of points leaders Miguel Molina, Rino Mastronardi and Matteo Cressoni (Iron Lynx).

Race results:

Cla	#	Driver	Car	Gap
1	41	Robert Kubica Louis Deletraz Ye Yifei	Oreca 07
2	30	Tristan Gommendy Rene Binder Memo Rojas	Oreca 07	5.318
3	65	Julien Canal Will Stevens James Allen	Oreca 07	19.544
4	37	Alexandre Coigny Nicolas Lapierre Charles Milesi	Oreca 07	23.198
5	32	Job Van Uitert Nico Jamin Manuel Maldonado	Oreca 07	26.236
6	28	Paul Lafargue Paul-Loup Chatin Patrick Pilet	Oreca 07	1'07.468
7	25	John Falb Rui Andrade Gustavo Menezes	Aurus 01	1'24.134
8	22	Philip Hanson Jonathan Aberdein Tom Gamble	Oreca 07	1'33.014
9	35	Francesco Dracone Sergio Campana Markus Pommer	Oreca 07	1 Lap
10	29	Matthieu Lahaye Jean Baptiste Lahaye	Oreca 07	1 Lap
11	4	Laurents Hörr Mathieu de	Duqueine M30 - D08	3 Laps
12	19	Nicolas Maulini Matthew Bell Niklas Krütten	Ligier JS P320	3 Laps
13	2	Wayne Boyd Robert Wheldon Edouard Cauhaupe	Ligier JS P320	3 Laps
14	8	Eric Trouillet Sebastien Page David Droux	Ligier JS P320	4 Laps
15	20	Rob Hodes Garett Grist Charles Crews	Ligier JS P320	4 Laps
16	18	Bressan Alessandro Andreas Laskaratos Damiano Fioravanti	Ligier JS P320	4 Laps
17	9	Matthias Kaiser Rory Penttinen	Ligier JS P320	5 Laps
18	3	Jim McGuire Duncan Tappy Andrew Bentley	Ligier JS P320	5 Laps
19	88	François Perrodo Emmanuel Collard Alessio Rovera	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	6 Laps
20	80	Matteo Cressoni Rino Mastronardi Miguel Molina	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	6 Laps
21	6	Nick Adcock Austin McCusker Max Koebolt	Ligier JS P320	6 Laps
22	83	Rahel Frey Sarah Bovy Michelle Gatting	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	6 Laps
23	93	Michael Fassbender Felipe Fernández Laser Richard Lietz	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	6 Laps
24	60	Claudio Schiavoni Giorgio Sernagiotto Paolo Ruberti	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	6 Laps
25	66	Jody Fannin Andrea Fontana Rodrigo Sales	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	7 Laps
26	77	Christian Ried Cooper MacNeil Matt Campbell	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	7 Laps
27	95	John Hartshorne Ross Gunn Ollie Hancock	Aston Martin Vantage AMR	8 Laps
28	7	Tony Wells Colin Noble Jr.	Ligier JS P320	8 Laps
29	11	Andrea Dromedari Jacopo Baratto Joey Alders	Ligier JS P320	9 Laps
	5	Cresp Christophe Fabien Lavergne Adrien Chila	Ligier JS P320	8 Laps
	14	Mattia Pasini Mateusz Kaprzyk Nicolas Pino	Ligier JS P320	21 Laps
	13	Martin Hippe Ugo De Aidan Read	Ligier JS P320	52 Laps
	24	Diego Menchaca Ferdinand Habsburg Richard Bradley	Oreca 07	80 Laps
	15	Mike Benham Alex Kapadia Malthe Jakobsen	Ligier JS P320	80 Laps
	55	Duncan Cameron Matthew Griffin David Perel	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	81 Laps
	34	Salih Yoluc Charles Eastwood Harry Tincknell	Oreca 07	86 Laps
	26	Roman Rusinov Franco Colapinto Nyck de Vries	Aurus 01	98 Laps
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