With a right-side tire change, James Calado's crew took only three seconds longer than their Hypercar rivals in the pit lane. At The Heart of Racing, the pit crew and crew chief are informing Daniel Mancinelli that they will keep an eye on the weather radar and for him to let them know if he sees spots of rain on the Aston Martin's windscreen. OK, everybody. Please stop talking about the rain. Apologies to the fans, the #38 Jota Porsche 963 did not take tires. Oh boy! Ferrari on BMW and the position change is done and dusted. Mann passes Rossi into turn two and Rossi loses a place on track, not an overall spot, to Castellaci. Rossi just has to put him under pressure and make him run wide once, and he'll be in for a drive through penalty. He has no mulligans left on track limits. No excuses.
We are five minutes from the halfway mark in the race. Ferrari #51 leads the sister car by 7.7 seconds. 111 laps now complete, 338 and a half miles. Manthey Pure Racing Porsche #92 still leads in GT3. They have led the race from pole. James Calado leads the way. Time to catch up with the tire manufacturer representatives from Michelin and Goodyear. Over the three days, we have seen over 73,000 people checking out the race action here at Imola. The tires are the same for Michelin as they were in Qatar. The new lettering and color coding helps to denote which compounds the teams are using. White badges for the Pilot Sport tire model, yellow lettering for denoting the medium compound format.
Red letters denote the hard compound, red for high heat. BMW chose to mix compounds in warm conditions. It is very visible to fans. Teams have a limited choice but can still play the tire strategy. This weekend at Imola, it is low energy on tires with few fast turns on the circuit and the tires are running 20 degrees cooler than they were in Qatar. Michelin has a technological reason to solve a motorsports problem, to be sustainable, and to get the word out to fans to come out and see the races. Technology transfer between endurance sports car racing and road going cars. Activation for the car makers and for Michelin as a tire. Work intensively to improve tire technology. The rain tire from Michelin, nearly half of it is made of recycled materials.
Keep the performance at the same level. Miguel Molina is now being harried by Nyck de Vries for second. Ferrari vs. Toyota. Nyck de Vries is all over Miguel Molina like a fly in his ear. Mikkel Pedersen in GT3 in one of the Ford Mustang's cops a 30 second penalty and had to stop and hold for track limits. Keep the car between the white lines, sunbeam. Speaking of GT3, now we hear from the Goodyear Tires representative, Mike McGregor. Sustainability and durability are critical. Goodyear and Michelin are in the same boat, bang for the buck, and durability. Pierre at Michelin and Mike at Goodyear, have the same mission.
73,000 people in attendance here at Imola to watch this race. At Goodyear, they have a new GT3 spec rain tire that has been in development for the last year and a half. They have used it in private testing at Spa Francorchamps in Belgium. It is dark and windy outside and we could see raindrops before this race ends. The gap now between Molina in the Ferrari and de Vries in the Toyota has yawned back out after catching lapped traffic ahead, with the GT3 cars. Lots of fans are here in open grandstands and I don't know if they've brought their mackintoshes and brollies or not. There is no compromise anymore on tire development between slicks and wets. No tire warmers being allowed means that the drivability is built into the tire and the drivers turn on the tires quicker than they used to.
We are currently having a Captain Cook at the 12th place battle on the road, while also talking more about the Goodyear tires. Harry Tincknell in the #99 Proton Competition Porsche 963 being pursued by Mikkel Jensen in the #93 Peugeot TotalEnergies Peugeot 9X8. Using fewer tires for sustainability as well. There is less needed to produce tires and ship less as well as having a more durable and this creates less waste as well as less need for recycling and avoiding ice cream headaches with logistics and more. Sustainability is something that yes, it has it's questions, but it sounds like in terms of tires, the right things are being planned and acted upon.
James Calado in the lead of the motor race is being given a new lap time target and being told to let up on pushing one of the tires. He is now 14 seconds ahead of the sister #50 Ferrari having completed 119 laps, 363 miles. 27.8 is the delta for the lap time to produce. He must hurry and push the left side tires if he wants t stay ahead of his teammates as well as the Porsche's and the Toyota's. At BMW in the WRT camp, and the travails of the #15 cars, hard compound rear tires are not working, and they have swapped back to the medium compound on the rear tires. It is not snowing. There is cottonwood tree dander blowing all over the track here at Imola.
Another close shave in GT3 between Lexus #87 and Corvette #82, side by side through Tamburello. Every time Miguel Molina hits traffic, first Nyck de Vries seems like he is out of it and won't catch up. Then, he pours on the steam and comes right back to the decklid of the Ferrari. The gap is yoyoing up and down due to traffic. There is a ten second lap time delta between the Hypercars and the GT3 cars here at Imola. You lose much less time here compared to where we were for the season opener in Qatar.
Slow speed helps the GT3 cars. The Hypercar has more downforce in higher speed turns but those are few and far between here at Imola. Going by the Peugeot, Nyck de Vries got stymied. But now he is inching closer to the Ferrari and one of the Porsche's up ahead. It looks like one of the five 963 Hypercar entries. That is the #38 Jota Porsche 963, and they don't have the mid-race speed they were hoping for. I wonder if their strategy might be backfiring on them. Both Porsche drivers are reporting rain on the road. The road outside the track to get in, and the public roads in the middle, are dry. This track has not yet been declared wet.
Until Race Director Edoardo Freitas declares the track wet, sorry chaps, you all are on slick tires and cannot change to wets until the man with the plan in Race Control gets on the horn and says, "OK, you may now choose to change to rain tires." Nyck de Vries in Toyota #7 has water streamed up the windscreen, but he also has some oil schmutz on that screen as well. The Hypercar leaders go past the GT3 leading Manthey Pure Racing Porsche 911 GT3R. The rain is starting to drip, starting to spritz just a bit. De Vries just has about half a tank of energy remaining.
Nico Costa is told by his crew chief that he is fuel limited as he is being harried by the #78 Lexus RC F GT3 of Kelvin van der Linde. #54 of Francesco Castellaci pits and so does the #46 BMW M4 GT3 of Valentino Rossi in for his second stop and ditto for his teammate in the #31 BMW M4 GT3 of Sean Gelael. Rossi is into a triple stint. Rossi has cold new tires on the right side and hot Goodyear tires on the left side. Harry Tincknell in the #99 Proton Competition Porsche 963 has gone by Edoardo Mortara in the #63 Lamborghini SC63 for Iron Lynx. This puts the Lambo in 12th and the Proton Porsche in 11th, 1.3 seconds down from Oliver Rasmussen in tenth spot in the #38 Jota Porsche 963.
Whoops! The #11 Isotta Fraschini is off the road, in the gravel trap, and in the barriers. If the young driver Carl Wattana Bennett cannot get out of the barriers, this will put out the safety car. The rain could also arrive. Maybe everyone will gamble. Put your chips on the table now, boys. You may need to use them. The Isotta is in the fence at Variante Alta. Bennett missed the apex and clipped the curb, firing him off to the right and sending him into the fence. He missed the apex, and the yellow curb was a launch ramp into the wall. We are at the highest elevation point and the rain is coming down. He should have bailed earlier realizing he wasn't going to make the turn.
Full Course Yellow in 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Full Course Yellow. We are under Full Course Yellow. The Pure Racing Porsche leading GT3 in the pit lane and now out. Everyone traveling at 80 kilometers an hour, 50 miles an hour under yellow. Tellingly, the Jota Porsche also went off the road so there must be moisture on the road, or fluid from a car. Stay in the car, stay calm, put the car back on terra firma, and get the miles in. Get the experience. Learn the car and what it can and cannot do. Isotta Fraschini did not test after Qatar. Mikkel Jensen is being told by the Peugeot team to report if he sees rain and that they expect to see it first at turn seven, Tosa.
There is light drizzle, just a little bit. There is a bit at turn nine as well, at Piratella. The Isotta Fraschini has had a far better performance today than it did at Qatar. The team's pit lane and garage performance is far better. They are a test team right now, not a race team. They are building up to being a race team. They have to turn themselves into a race team, think like it, act like it, and turn the car into a race car. Get the miles. That is your job. Glickenhaus and Peugeot have done it. Isotta and Lamborghini and Alpine are doing it. Bennett rejoins the circuit as the race leader is under investigation by the stewards for a technical infringement.
So, this is the #51 Ferrari of James Calado. The wind is picking up as well as we can see on camera. Fans are donning their rain ponchos as well as we could see raindrops soon. If the wind is picking up, then rain will likely follow soon. Two and a half hours to go, removing Full Course Yellow in 30 seconds. 20 seconds, 15 seconds, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Full Course Yellow removed. Punch it! Nyck de Vries wastes no time, and he sweeps past Miguel Molina! The #20 BMW is also right on the gearbox of the #83 Ferrari! So, the battles are becoming hot and heavy in Hypercar with two and a half hours of racing left on the board.
That was a colossal restart from Nyck de Vries! He caught Miguel Molina napping! The stewards are going to be having a Captain Cook with microscopic detail about the FCY and the restart just the same. Release it but don't anticipate the zero. Uh oh. We have a slow Peugeot on the circuit. More troubles on the way for them or so it appears. #94 Loic Duval goes off the road and shoots through the gravel trap! He almost picked up a place on the Jota Porsche, one of them, but knew right then he had to give it back to not incur a penalty.
Meanwhile, the Isotta Fraschini is in the pit lane. de Vries is now putting daylight between himself and Molina and Toyota #7 are now 12 seconds behind the leading Ferrari, the #51 which has completed 126 laps, 384 miles. Oh! Oh! Oh! The Porsche gets tagged by the Lamborghini GT3 car and he is wriggling all over the place! He loses traction! #12 is skittering through the gravel trap! Callum Ilott just barely kisses the wall. He almost slammed into the tail of the Toyota! Rain is beginning to fall as we see on the windscreen of the #7 Toyota. #94 off the road, again. Oh dear. There's gravel all over the tires and #94 has hit something because the left side headlight and the left front corner of the car is missing. It isn't contact. Boom! The left front Michelin tire, explodes!
Peugeot have had a race to forget. Look at the massive debris field on the frontstretch! Oh man! We are going to deploy a Virtual Safety Car in 30 seconds. The leader is in the lane now, and the pit lane remains open until the true safety car is scrambled. Ferrari #51 stops now. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. We are under Virtual Safety Car. Nyck de Vries may have passed under VSC. That is a no, no. I think Ilott got squirrely over a bump. This is going to put Ferrari #51 completely behind the eight ball. They need a full green flag stop. Everyone else is trundling 'round at 80 kilometers an hour and the #93 sister Peugeot kept the car on the island while the sister car went off.
The tire still holds air, it didn't fully explode. It just delaminated. Loic Duval is out of the car. Both cars have been punted off in the first turn. You cannot come back from that in such a deep field as we have in the Hypercar class. Now, the crane is moving the #12 Jota Porsche 963 to safety. This is Callum Ilott's second excursion into the gravel trap this afternoon as we see the #83 yellow Ferrari 499P in the pits. Marshals are sweeping up the debris and they have a ton of it to undertake. #83 is doing a pit stop under Virtual Safety Car. Now, the #7 Toyota of Nyck de Vries has worked his way back up into the lead.
Four new Michelin tires for the #51 Ferrari as James Calado requests that information from the team while we remain under Virtual Safety Car. Teams absolutely must do everything and anything to keep their drivers informed of tire status, fuel status track conditions, you name it. Some drivers want that. Others are "leave me alone and let me drive, please!" Maximum tire warmup but you cannot run at more than 80 kilometers an hour. That doesn't sound like it computes correctly. Calado is not a happy bunny. His hope is for the safety car to be dispatched. Ferrari #50 is changing all four tires under the Virtual Safety Car.
Everyone else's tires will cool off behind the safety car. We will see a lead change between the Ferrari's as #51 is only now entering Rivazza and the #50 is sure to leapfrog the sister Ferrari out of the pit lane. Hold the phone. Nyck de Vries didn't pit and so he leads the motor race in Toyota #7. Under Virtual Safety Car you keep the pit lane open for two laps for the entire field to stop so nobody gets a free pass. The #51 Ferrari were committed to pitting as the Virtual Safety Car is called. Toyota to the lane, Isotta Fraschini to the lane. We need a replay of Nyck de Vries from the onboard camera, in slow motion. If the yellows were waving when he passed, he is in a world of pain.
I am sure Ferrari are protesting the living daylights out of that pass for second, screaming at the pit marshals until they are blue in the face. Nyck de Vries comes to the lane from fourth spot. We need to see how this pit stop works out. As soon as the green waved, de Vries absolutely floored it. There is a driver change at Toyota and full field pit stops under Virtual Safety Car. We know some of the lower ranked teams are out of contention such as Peugeot, Lamborghini, Isotta Fraschini, BMW, Cadillac, or even Porsche. I think the race today will be mano e mano between Toyota and Ferrari. Valentino Rossi has finished his driving stint as the Iron Lynx Lamborghini exits the lane.
Raindrops at turn one reported, at Variante Bassa. All cars with rain lights on in low mode. Safety Car deployed. Safety Car deployed. Everyone has had a chance to pit but there has been zero chance to bolt on the wet weather tires. Kamui Kobayashi is now in the #7 car and Mike Conway is explaining the situation along with Nyck de Vries. There is a human time difference on the countdowns. Everyone has taken their pit stops but the race had not been declared wet yet. If the weather turns nasty, the entire field could trundle back down the lane. Yesterday evening it poured with rain. On paper, as it stands, Toyota are in the lead of the motor race.
Nyck de Vries is confident has pass was clear, clean, and clinical. The safety car remains in the pit lane waiting to pick up the leader. Toyota leads overall and in Hypercar with the #7 of Kamui Kobayashi while in GT3 it is Joel Sturm in the #92 Manthey Pure Racing Porsche 911 GT3R (992). The class leaders will get waved by, so they stay on the lead lap behind the safety car. One is the #91 Manthey EMA Porsche and the other is one of the two United Autosports McLaren's, but right now we need to know which one. Is it #59? Or is it #95? #95 is eighth while the #59 is tenth. So, it is #95 the first car a lap down. In Hypercar, the race leader is Kamui Kobayashi in the #7 Toyota. So, that isn't a problem.
Currently, #7 and #50 happened to have gone ahead of the sister #51 Ferrari because it pitted under green flag conditions before the yellow. The whole field is circulating at 80 kilometers an hour, 50 miles an hour. The move from de Vries was done with a second to spare before the yellow lights switched on, but it isn't confirmed yet. Hang on. We are now preparing the pass around procedure so all cars ineligible for it must bear to the right. The pass around has started. Cars to the left side of the road may not zigzag. The brollies are up even with light rain. The Lamborghini has stopped and started again. Daniil Kvyat now at the controls, the Russian former F1 driver.
We have an interview at WRT with both Valentino Rossi and his MotoGP motorcycle rider Marco Bezzecchi. Rossi says his stint was pretty good although the second stint wa tougher with the track conditions and with used tires. So, they are fighting for the podium. Marco Bezzecchi is happy to be here to support his boss and maybe Marco will follow in his boss's footsteps. Bezzecchi is a very talented motorcycle racer. The rain is drizzling through turn two but at the other end of the circuit the skies are gloomy, and it is raining cats and dogs on that side of the road. The #82 TF Sport Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R is in the pit lane with Frenchman Sebastien Baud getting behind the wheel for his stint.
We are under the Safety Car. But the track is not yet remotely damp on the back part. The Safety Car is picking up the pace. The pit lane is damp, and Toyota are considering a pit stop. They could box soon. The rainfall will get worse as the drivers speed up. It is a psychological barrier from in the driving seat. The track could be giving a lot of grip on warm sticky slick tires but not on stone cold tires at ambient temperature. It is thought now that the rain won't last, and they will stay out at Ferrari. This is what Miguel Molina is told in car #50. Hot slicks on a damp road will still give you grip. Nobody has hot tires. I think we will see cars taking their turn on the whirligig here in a wee while.
At Variante Alta it is far too wet for slick tires. Edoardo Freitas had a discussion with the safety car driver. Is it safe to race? Apparently so, because the safety car is peeling into the pit lane this lap. We will be going back to green. Away we go on stone cold tires, full fuel tanks, and on a wet road! Once again, the Isotta Fraschini is off the road! Canadian driver Antonio Seravalle has taken over the driving chores, but this is one of his first races and it is his first time on track in anger here at Monza, and in the wet! Watch out for turn seven at Tosa going up the hill. That is where it will be at it's absolute wettest.
Corvette #82 spins again. Sebastien Baud losing grip and doing everything he can to stay on terra firma. Peugeot #93 off and launching across the grass verge up the escape road and back onto the track! That's JEV, Jean Eric Vergne. Kamui Kobayashi twitching under braking, gets loose, and the Ferrari goes by! The Tifosi are going bananas! That was like taking candy from baby, if you can get off the corner without squirming or spinning like a top. Kobayashi all over the road trying to defend from GT3 cars bearing down on him as well. That isn't his race by any stretch, but he is just trying to stay away from those pesky buggers.
GT3 cars will have more mechanical grip than the Hypercars. Lamborghini #60 is overtaking the Hypercar overall lead and the Pure Racing GT3 Porsche! In the dry, it was taking them two to three laps to find tire temperature but in the wet it will take lap after lap after lap before those tires are fully heated! Ferrari stays out. Toyota in the lane with #7 and both Porsche factory cars in, #5, and #6. Excuse me. One factory Penske Porsche, the #6, and one privateer Porsche, the #99 Proton Competition Fat Turbo entry. We have the #38 Jota Porsche, the #35 Alpine, the #93 Peugeot, the #2 Cadillac. You name it, they are in the lane for tire changes to wets.
Wet Michelin tires bolted on. Ferrari are taking a different tack. The team radios to Miguel Molina saying, "we don't believe the rain is going to last." Porsche Penske Motorsports split their strategy. No double stacking. The #5 stays out and the #6 is in the lane now. All three Ferrari's stay out. Both #7 and #8 Toyota pitted. They have chopped across the nose of the #77 Proton Competition Ford Mustang GT3 and boxed him in. The rain is said it won't last but it needs to last long enough to maybe have the risk of spinning off. If it dries, some cars will need to get off the wets and back onto slicks. This race has been turned on its head. Toyota have surrendered the race lead to Ferrari who have taken their brave pills without a doubt and are pushing, pushing, pushing.
The #83 Ferrari is back to fourth place. We have seen a reprimand for the #51 Ferrari, and the two Aston Martin's, the #27 Heart of Racing entry and the #777 D'station entry. The track conditions seem to be improving on the back half of the circuit compared to the front half. Tiptoeing through Tamburello chicane. It needs to rain more heavily for the wet tires to work. What do wet weather tires do to the track? They channel water offline. Calado is catching Molina, but he has the Lexus GT3 car in the way. As the light level drops, we can see the cars sparking on the rear end. It is like the 1980s and the Group C era! Our leaders, the Porsche's and the Ferrari's have swallowed the brave pills by the handful.
Kobayashi is now 18 seconds in-arrears of Robert Shwartzman in Ferrari #83 who was the last of the four cars to stay out and not hit the lane for wet weather tires. A pit stop infringement called for the #93 Peugeot which will have five seconds of time penalty added to their next scheduled stop. 1:53 for Robert Shwartzman and 2:02 for Antonjo Fuoco in the race lead. Now, we can see Calado being overtaken by the Lexus around the outside of Piratella as he is catching his teammate, Miguel Molina.
Drivers might be screaming for wet weather tires, but there is a catch 22. That is, the rain needs to last for an hour to keep the wet tires alive because in the dry, they chunk, they fall apart, they turn to jelly, and become absolutely useless. Water is the only thing that will keep a wet tire consistent and hold it together. Michelin and Goodyear both state that their wet compounds will go into the dry but that said, in dry conditions, the tread blocks, the tread sipes will be eaten alive and the wet tires will come out looking like thruppenny bits!
The cars are sparking like the Group C cars would in the '80s. This track here at Imola will dry very fast because it is only wet enough for the wet tires to be effective at the very top of the track. When you get to the bottom end of the circuit, then you are once again, in a king size world of pain. ...and, just like that, we have yet another racing hour in the bag.
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