The battle for second, third, and fourth continues hot and heavy. Chaves clearing traffic through the Piff Paff (Fangnes). Ferrari #38 has spun into the final turn. That is the ST Racing with Rinaldi Ferrari 296 GT3 and now Chaves goes to the outside balked by Vanthoor. van der Linde in second place. In replay at La Source, that was a touch between Vanthoor and the Ferrari. Samantha Tan, Jon Miller, Isaac Tutumlu Lopez, and Leonard Weiss, the quartet of drivers. Kelvin van der Linde using traffic to his advantage and now, Henrique Chaves has his hands full with the Mercedes. Five cars won't go into a space meant for only one.
Matt Bell lets Vanthoor go in one of the Mercedes AMG GT3's. Mattia Drudi is running on his own and pulling away from Kelvin van der Linde steadily, and rapidly. Raffaele Marciello has cleared by Jannes Fittje and Charlie Fagg. Kelvin van der Linde is 12.9 seconds down on Mattia Drudi who is truly motoring. We have a spin at Pouhon with a ragged rear wing. Someone has backed into the fence. It is a Mercedes He barely hit the fence but those are four square tires. Now, wholesale pit stops. #57 for Winward Racing, that is driven by Indy Dontje sharing with Russell Ward, and Phillip Ellis. Full Course Yellow. Get the car out of harm's way and Mattia Drudi bang on in the lane now.
Yours truly was taking a shoert break and under Full Course Yellow we have had wholesale pit stops. When you uncouple the air line from the air jack, that restarts the engine. A fascinating idea. Nikki Thiim has taken over from Kelvin van der Linde and Luca Engstler is also in that car as Kevin Estre is now at the wheel of the #92 Manthey EMA Porsche. Miguel Ramos now in the #188 Garage 59 McLaren. The safety car si on the road and they are doing the wave by to find the leading car. Patrick Kujala waved through and now theypick up the leader, Dennis Marschall. Everyone will be catching up to the crocodile.
This is the first time we have seen a wave by procedure in the 24 Hours of Spa. We have also seen this for a long time in IMSA and for the first time last month at the 24 Hours of Le Mans for the FIA World Endurance Championship as well. Henrique Chaves says that he had a wonderful stint and did what the team wanted him to do, getting to the best place possible without any risk. That overtake on "Lello" Marciello was wild. We are now under the safety car with a closed pit lane. Everyone has made their pit stops by now. The pit lane is closed but now the race is under safety car conditions and the cars can speed up in a line, waiting for the wave by for the lapped cars in Gold, Silver, Bronze, and Pro-Am to get a lap back on their class rivals.
It does not include the Pro class. This is a long lap. It would take half the time at a shorter circuit. It will take longer with 69 cars in a queue and getting them to different places on the road. It will add a good few laps each process. It is time for dinner, for Belgian beer and perhaps for sausages and frites mayonnaise. Next lap around we should do the wave by procedure. They are doing a double file procedure to see who can unlap themselves. The left lane stops and resumes and now we get everyone pointed past the safety car.
All should be good to go here. There is a gap between the lead wave by cars and the others. Dennis Marschall using the windscreen wipers. Hmmm. Mother Nature might be playing a joker here. More wave bu's as the green lights are on the safety car. The lapped traffic unlaps itself and so then, you have everyone put together and poor old Dennis Marschall's gap has gone to zero. Wave by now complete. The pit lane is open switching the safety car back to yellow lights. Pit lane is reopened and we see one of the Ferrari's taking the opportunity for service.
Dennis Marschall now leads the motor race in Audi #40. Team manager for the Modena Motorsports Porsche to the Race Director's office. Thank you. Rain is due in 40 minutes. So, this could get spicy. It'll put the cat among the pigeons for dead sure. Safety car in the lane this lap. Okie dokie then. Eddie Cheever III. now at the wheel of the #93 Sky Tempesta McLaren. Kelvin van der Linde will be in hot pursuit of Dennis Marschall. Safety cars breed safety cars in many types of racing and we hope that won't happen but you never know.
Miguel Ramos is now in the #188 McLaren and Kevin Estre too will be on it as soon as we go green. Finlay Hutchison is now ninth overall in Silver. That is the #12 Comtoyou Racing Audi he shares with Sam DeJonghe, Loris Hezemans, and Lucas Legeret. The skies are darkening as Kevin Estre moves past Miguel Ramos and Timur Boguslavskiy is now back at the races. He is turning it on as we speak. Through Pouhon they go, downhill. We have rain now on certain parts of the road. Garage 59 and Andrew Kirkaldy, the team boss, said that we could see rain. Gilles Magnus losing time hand over fist and he also has a 30 second penalty for track limits. So poor old Gilles Magnus has the sword of Damocles hanging over him. Yeesh!
Laurens Vanthoor now under investigation for hitting another car and Finlay Hutchison makes a pass on Valentino Rossi for eighth through La Source! Good onya' Finlay. Rossi out of Les Combes has his BMW teammate Dries Vanthoor right behind him. Rossi was skating around like mad through Les Combes. Downhill they go into Pouhon another time. Finlay Hutchison is now being given treatment by "The Doctor". Hutchison repelling the pressure and Dries Vanthoor is right behind him. So both WRT BMW's are going for it. The WRT #32 BMW won at the Kyalami 9 Hours back in February. Nicki Thiim, in this race, five or six years ago, he was scintillating!
He had a huge crunch into the wall last year that put him out of the race. But he is defending now from Laurens Vanthoor and Dennis Marschall is not getting away and it is raining. The rain is beginning to fall in the Ardennes Forest. Grab your mackintosh. Kevin Estre cops a ten second penalty as Laurin Heinrich is hustling on in pursuit, look, of the Ferrari of Robert Shwartzman. That was the contact between Laurens Vanthoor and Isaac Tutumlu Lopez. Don't dwell on penalties, just move on and get on with the program. Work together as a team and stay with the plan.
Valentino Rossi wants to make his move on the other #31 WRT BMW with Adam Carroll driving. We have seen Carroll in a Mercedes in GT World Challenge America. Yours truly hopes to catch up with one of their recent races. Stay tuned for that and for the previous GTWC Europe event at Paul Ricard. Now, Tim Heinemann is the next car that Finlay Hutchison has to catch. Heinemann is booking it currently. However, he is stuck in traffic. Rossi is still hammering Finlay Hutchison. The Audi, very svelte in it's design while the BMW M4 GT3 is a big bruiser of a motorcar.
Fabian Schiller in the #777 Al Manar Mercedes along with Patric Niederhauser and Max Hesse in the #998 Rowe Racing BMW. Schiller sharing the #777 Mercedes with Lucas Auer and Luca Stolz. Hutchison is comfortably ahead in the Silver class. 61 laps now completed. Dennis Marschall continuing to lead the motor race as Kevin Estre is indeed right on the edge trying to catch Nikki Thiim. This is the lead battle, covered by the proverbial blanket. Dries Vanthoor through Pouhon makes the pass on the Audi and now Valentino Rossi is trying but he is denied by Finlay Hutchison and now, Fabian Schiller tries Rossi and they almost come together!
Egad! That was a close shave! A piece of paper between those cars through Campus! Nikki Thiim takes the lead away from Dennis Marschall and now, Kevin Estre is going to set up a pass into Les Combes. No dice this time 'round, sunbeam. Dennis Marschall had to concede. In replay, Thiim launches it to the inside before La Source! That was a mega, full send move! More smoke from a Lamborghini! Fabrizio Crestani. Hard to tell if it is mechanical, or tire rub on bodywork. That was from the left front corner of the car. He may have a deflating tire just like we saw with Alessio Rovera. The car is more nervous, more ragged in it's handling.
issu gets loose and has a tank slapper through Speakers' corner and into Pouhon as well. Estre makes the move for second place on Dennis Marschall. Estre wants to run after Nikki Thiim, that's for dead sure. No walk in the park trying to pass Thiim. He is a fighter. BMW #31 of Adam Carroll is a long way back. Carroll sharing with Tim Whale and Lewis Proctor. That was a full rotation from the #31 BMW! Holy moly Martha! That was extremely close! Thiim vs. Estre fighting now and poor old Dennis Marschall is losing time to the Porsche. 64 laps now completed.
Dries Vanthoor side by side with Tim Heinemann who slams the door in his face! The Porsche keeps the speed up with a shallower corner exit than the BMW. Heinemann though, knew, he had to give it up to Vanthoor. Alex Malykhin now has Antonio Fuoco crawling all over him. Fuoco taking over the AF Corse Ferrari #71 from Daniel Serra. We saw Fuoco at Le Mans in the Ferrari Hypercar. Valentino Rossi and Adam Carroll did make contact and it has been noted by the stewards. Mirko Bortolotti in a world of pain in 68th place, five laps down. It could very well be game over. Making up five laps in 21 hours, well, we'll see.
I think Carroll might have had some contact. Did he spin all by his lonesome? No. Rossi made a mistake on that one, clearly. Oy yoy yoy! Valentino Rossi now reeling in Fabian Schiller into Bruxelles corner. 66 laps now completed. The Rossi fans are indeed happy to see "The Doctor" doing well. Thiim continues to lead the motor race by over two and a half seconds to the good on Kevin Estre over Dennis Marschall, Miguel Ramos, Timur Boguslavkiy, and Marco Mapelli. Drive through penalty for the #38 Ferrari of Isaac Tutumlu Lopez for a dozen track limits violations. So he will tumble down the order like a marble down a chute.
Ramos leads Bronze, Hutchison leads Silver. Colin Braun leads the Pro-Am class over Patrick Kujala.
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