Quintarelli, Buhler Hang On To Win Race 2

Mattéo Quintarelli hung on to secure a Race 2 victory alongside Lena Buhler, who became the first-ever woman to win a Road to Le Mans race overall on Saturday.

The No. 50 23Events Racing Ligier JS P325 Toyota inherited the overall lead when the No. 29 Forestier Racing by VDS Ligier of Louis Rousset was handed a penalty for opening-lap contact after Buhler made up early ground early on to bring the car into second position.

Quintarelli then survived strong last-lap pressure from the R-Ace GP Duqueine D09 Toyota of Hugo Schwarze to secure a first win for the team by 0.531 seconds on the morning of the start of the 24 Hours of Le Mans later in the afternoon.

The No. 70 Gebhardt Motorsport Ligier of Oscar Tunjo and Valentino Catalano won out in a fight for the final overall podium position, with Forestier’s No. 92 Ligier claiming fourth and Reiter Racing’s Miklas Basil Born and Bence Valint rounding out the top five.

Antti Rammo led the LMP3 Pro-Am class comfortably during his opening stint in the opening stages and maintained DKR Engineering’s advantage to take the class win in the No. 2 Ginetta G61-LT-P325-EVO Toyota alongside Thomas Laurent.

Laurent survived multiple restarts en route to DKR’s Race 2 victory.

Team Motopark came out on top in a tense GT3 class battle with the Bartone Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo of Anthony Bartone and Steve Jans.

While Bartone leaped to the lead during his stint, a pass by Lukas Dunner and a later penalty for the Bartone squad secured the win for the Austrian and Heiko Neumann.

A safety car was necessary after multiple Lap 1 incidents in the opening sequence of corners, triggered initially by Sebastian Gravlund’s No. 8 Team Virage going off after being hit by the  Rousset, who was challenging for the lead.

Gino-Generoso Forgione was collected by Josep Mayola Comadira’s Biogas Motorsport Ferrari just behind, with Forgione immediately coming under investigation by the stewards for “behavior” after jumping from his No. 21 AF Corse 296 GT3 and began kicking and punching the drivers’ side of the No. 23 machine before being held back and escorted off the circuit by track workers.

Patrick Dinkeldein also retired with damage collected on the opening revolution of the 8.467-mile French race track.

With under 24 minutes to go, a second safety car was triggered for a pair of separate incidents when the No. 33 Kessel Racing Ferrari was nudged into the Arnage barriers while prototype traffic was going through amidst a battle for position, while Rory van der Steur went off at Indianapolis in his No. 11 Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo.

Racing resumed with ten minutes to go, before a third and final safety car was brought out nearly immediately for the stricken No. 37 CLX Motorsport Ligier of Theodor Jensen, who spun out of the Ford chicane and collided with the barriers on the front straight. The safety car period ended with one racing lap remaining.

The off-sequence leading No. 7 and No. 4 Nielsen Racing Adess AD25 Toyotas collided with one another in pit lane, slowing their mandatory stops.

The race featured drama before the start as well, with the Pro-Am No. 64 LMP3 entry of Michael Doppelmayr spinning on the formation lap, while the No. 23 Biogas Motorsport Ferrari 296 GT3 also spun separately while on the way to the green flag.

Pre-race trouble also struck the No. 59 Racing Spirit of Le Mans Aston Martin of Anthony McIntosh, who failed to make the start, while CLX  elected to change the nose on its No. 97 LMP3 class entry, forcing it to start from the pit lane in the hands of Cedric Oltramare.

Results: Race 2