Third Red Flag Period Introduced Shortly After Halfway

The TotalEnergies 6 Hours of Spa was placed under red flag conditions for a third time shortly after the halfway stage of a chaotic FIA World Endurance Championship race.

LMP2 driver Robin Frijns held the overall lead in the No. 31 Team WRT Oreca 07 Gibson, ahead of Toyota Gazoo Racing’s Kamui Kobayashi and Glickenhaus Racing’s Pipo Derani.

The third red flag came out after three hours and 20 minutes to facilitate barrier repairs following an accident for Inter Europol Competition LMP2 driver Alex Brundle at the exit of Turn 9.

Brundle climbed out of the No. 34 Oreca unaided after sliding off in wet conditions, at a point of the circuit where a handful of cars have gone off during the afternoon.

Frijns cycled to the outright lead during the second stoppage, ahead of the No. 36 Alpine A480 Gibson driven by Andre Negrao and the No. 7 Toyota GR010 Hybrid with Mike Conway at the helm.

Conway wasted little time in getting past Negrao at La Source, but was unable to close the margin to Frijns who built a lead of around 14 seconds in the lower-category prototype.

Conway, Kobayashi and Jose Maria Lopez are Toyota’s remaining hope in round two of the FIA World Endurance Championship after their teammates in the No. 8 entry retired with a car issue.

That occurred during a safety car that succeeded the first red flag, which came out shortly after the one-hour mark when LMP2 driver Miro Konopka crashed on the approach to Campus.

The race was put behind a safety car in anticipation of a restart, but intensifying rainfall prompted race control to bring the red flags back out just before two hours.

Racing properly resumed with two and a half hours completed, but several drivers had off-track moments in the tricky conditions.

They included Team Penske’s Dane Cameron, whose Oreca went off twice at Bruxelles and at the exit of Turn 9, while Richard Mille Racing’s Sebastien Ogier and JOTA’s Antonio Felix da Costa also found the gravel.

There was also a change to the GTE-Am lead when No. 54 AF Corse driver Francesco Castellacci looped around on his own coming out of Turn 9, enabling Team Project 1 Porsche driver Matteo Cairoli to sail through.

The No. 52 AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE Evo gained a huge lead during the red flag by opting not to pit while its rivals came in.

Miguel Molina enjoyed a one-lap advantage at halfway, ahead of Michael Christensen in the No. 92 Porsche 911 RSR-19 and Alessandro Pier Guidi in the No. 51 Ferrari.

One driver to gain ground during the half-hour spell of green flag running leading up to halfway was Alex Lynn, who progressed from seventh to fifth overall with overtakes on his United Autosports teammate Filipe Albuquerque and Prema’s Robert Kubica.

Lynn ranked behind Glickenhaus driver Derani, Alpine’s Negrao and the second-placed Toyota of Conway heading into the halfway mark, when a Full Course Yellow period occurred due to Matthieu Lahaye beaching his Ultimate Oreca at Fagnes.

Frijns pitted first, briefly handing the overall lead back to Conway, but WRT regained the lead when Toyota brought its No. 7 car in for a driver change to Kobayashi.

The 6 Hours of Spa is the second consecutive race to be affected by three red flags, after the 1000 Miles of Sebring season-opener in March.