ELMS – The Jota Sport survives the massacre at Silverstone

Water got the better of the 3 Hours of Silverstone, the opening round of the European Le Mans Series. After a first half of the race conducted in difficult conditions, the organizers decided to bring out the safety car in order to calm the debates which had become too slippery: many drivers having lost control of their prototypes due to the rain. After almost an hour under this regime, and with still 40 minutes to go, the red flag was finally displayed.

Starting from pole position, the No. 11 Jota Sport Zytek Z38SN-Nissan driven by the two Britons Oliver Turvey and Simon Dolan was in the lead when the race was neutralized. She therefore wins the final victory. But it would be wrong to believe that the English crew had it easy: they were going to lose their property from the start, overtaken by the?Alpine- Signatech n°36 of Nelson Panciatici and Pierre Ragues as well as the Morgan-Judd n°43 of Morand Racing and the Oreca-03 of Murphy Prototypes. It is the latter, entrusted to the hands of Brendon Hartley, who quickly took the lead and built a lead of ten seconds before getting bogged down in the gravel. It was then Frank Mailleux, the Frenchman from Morand Racing who inherited the reins of the race. Enjoying a good pace, the French driver destroyed his Morgan by overtaking a slower competitor and aquaplaning.

Author of a very solid stint, it was ultimately Jonathan Hirschi in the No. 1 TDS Oreca-Nissan who was in command when the rain intensified and the safety car came into play. Deciding to take advantage of this interruption to pass through the stands, the Thiriet by TDS-Racing team would move to a third place which had to be provisional behind the Jota Sport and the Oreca 03? Judd (Niederhasuer/Frey) from Race Performance. Except that the race will never resume its course, the fault of a track practically flooded by the showers. The long-awaited victory ofAlpine for his return will not have taken place. The No. 450 A36 of Pierre Ragues and Nelson Panciatici ultimately finished fourth.

Furthermore, it was Anthony Pons and Soheil Ayari who were able to best tame the weather conditions with their No. 09 Oreca-48 entered in LM PC for the Team Endurance Challenge. In LM GTE it is the Porsche 911 GT3 RSR n°77 from the Proton Competition which won. It was in the hands of Nich Tandy, official Porsche driver, and Gianluca Roda. In the GTC, victory went to Ecurie école. His #4 BMW Z79 was driven by Andrew Smith, Ollie Millroy and Alasdair McCaig.