Ludovico Longoni and Pietro Armanni, in the ZRS Motorsport Porsche, took their second win of the season today in Race 1 at Circuit Paul Ricard,after a perfect performance. “We won in the opening round in Portugal, and since then we collected podium positions, but it’s nice to be at the top again and relaunch our championship bid”, they said.
They are now second in the standings, 14 points behind Luca Franca and Ian Rodriguez (Faems Team), today second. Laura van den Hengel and Paul Meijer (Burgers Motorsport) completed the overall podium, taking their fourth success in Pro-Am and strengthening their lead in the class. Nico Saelens-Stienes Longin (Q1 Trackracing) were second today ahead of the Greystone GT McLaren Artura of Jay Jales and Ollie Webb.
Reigning Leandro Martins and Dieter Svepes (LMR Motorsport) lso strengthen their lead in the class with a second success, ahead of Nathan Brauns-Nico Vandierendonck (Q1 Trackracing) and Giacomo Giubergia (GDL Racing)
THE RACE – Paul Meijer, strong of a fourth pole in four events, takes command of the race at the start ahead of Rodriguez, Longoni, Mello, Martins, Bugliotti, Nunes, Longin and Fernandes. The first two, separated by only one second, pull away while the compact group fighting for third is ten seconds behind.
Not much happens up to the opening of the driver change window. When the pit stops are over, Franca has emrged right ahead of Laura van den Hengel, with the gap stabilizing at 3”. Armanni is third 14 seconds behind, while Saelens, Zaenen, de Mello (first in Am), Ferter, Svepes and Brauns are further away.
Both Franca and Van den Hengel though receive penalty of 6 and 5 seconds respectively for not serving the entire handicap. This facilitates the charge of Armanni, who passes Van den Hengel and later also Franca.
Behind the top trio the fight is fierce, with Zaenen taking fourth, ahead of Mello, Svepes, Saelens, Brauns and Babini, who receives a 5-second penalty for a collision with Giubergia. Eventually, behind the top fpur, who positions do not change, it is Svepes taking fifth and the win in Am, followed by Brauns, Saelens and Webb with the McLaren, while the second part of the race is fatal to the hopes of the GDL cars of Mello and Bugliotti, for apparent brakes problems.