Gounon to Replace Habsburg for 6H Spa

Jules Gounon is set for a second appearance with Alpine’s Hypercar squad in the FIA World Endurance Championship, standing in for Ferdinand Habsburg at Spa-Francorchamps as the Austrian continues his recovery from a back injury.

Confirmed as part of an updated entry list for the 6 Hours of-Spa Francorchamps, Gounon will return to the cockpit of the No. 35 Alpine A424 for the third WEC round at the Belgian venue.

Similarly to Imola, where he made his prototype debut as Alpine’s reserve driver, the Andorran racer will team up with Charles Milesi and Paul-Loup Chatin.

The No. 35 car finished 13th at Imola after both of the French squad’s cars were caught up in a multi-car collision on the opening lap.

Habsburg has been on the sidelines ever since he suffered two fractured lumbar vertebrae in a crash testing the A424 LMDh car during a test at Motorland Aragon in Spain.

The Austrian was included on the provisional pre-event entry list issued by WEC at the end of April, although an Alpine spokesperson indicated to Sportscar365 at the time that that was “a placeholder that could be changed if he doesn’t fully recover in time.”

He was replaced in last weekend’s European Le Mans Series round at Paul Ricard by fellow Alpine driver Chatin, who finished second overall alongside Alex Garcia and Frederik Vesti.

Gounon, meanwhile, kicked off his Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS Sprint Cup campaign at Brands Hatch, finishing third in Race 2.

Ralf Aron, who stood in for Gounon at Climax Racing during the Fanatec GT Asia season opener at Sepang has been confirmed to once again take the Andorran’s place for the second round at Buriram.

Elsewhere in the Hypercar class, Proton Competition is confirmed to be running a two-driver lineup as Harry Tincknell has dropped off the entry due to clashing commitments with the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.

Tincknell was originally shown to be driving the No. 99 Porsche 963 alongside Neel Jani and Julien Andlauer, but will race with Ford Performance’s factory GTD Pro effort at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca.

Instead, Jani and Andlauer will share driving duties for the event, bringing the total number of two-driver pairings for the race to five.