Proton Porsche Leads Opening Hour at Spa

Proton Competition’s customer Porsche 963 led the opening hour of the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps as Julien Andlauer pulled off a pass on poleman Frederick Makowiecki to seize the advantage.

From third on the grid, Andlauer held position on what was a relatively eventful opening lap before going on the attack on Alex Lynn’s Cadillac, passing for second on the sixth lap.

While Makowiecki had opened up a small advantage at the head of the field in the No. 5 Penske Porsche 963, Andlauer soon cruised up to the tail of his fellow countryman.

The two ran within a second of each other for several laps before Makowiecki got baulked by Takeshi Kimura’s Akkodis ASP Lexus RC F GT3 exiting the fast Blanchimont left-hander on lap 16.

That gave Andlauer all the invitation he needed and he completed the move before braking for the Bus Stop chicane.

With the opening round of pitstops looming, Andlauer held a lead of around seven seconds over Makowiecki with one hour complete.

Lynn’s No. 2 Cadillac V-Series.R spent the first stint of the race going backwards through the field, with Laurens Vanthoor passing the Briton to temporarily make it a 1-2-3 for Porsche in the championship-leading No. 6 Penske 963.

That was until Antonio Giovinazzi, who had made rapid progress from 10th on the grid in the No. 51 Ferrari 499P, passed Vanthoor for third not long after the Belgian ran wide at the Bus Stop.

Robert Kubica completed the top five in the third-string No. 83 AF Corse Ferrari.

Charles Milesi also enjoyed a strong start to the race in the No. 35 Alpine A424 which had its engine changed overnight, rising to sixth ahead of Will Stevens’ Hertz Team JOTA Porsche.

Lynn rounded off a bruising first hour in eighth in the solo Cadillac, followed by Marco Wittmann in the best of the BMW M Hybrid V8s and Nicolas Lapierre in the second Alpine.

Toyota’s leading contender, the No. 8 GR010 Hybrid of Sebastien Buemi, was handed an early drive-through penalty for a power overboost on the formation lap, dropping the Swiss driver down to 17th.

The sister No. 7 car of Mike Conway ran 13th, one place behind the recovering No. 50 Ferrari that Nicklas Nielsen started from the rear of the Hypercar field.

Peugeot’s Paul di Resta was in trouble early on as he made a pitstop after only four laps to perform a power cycle, putting him 19th and last in Hypercar.

In LMGT3, polesitter Sarah Bovy had extended a monster 30-second advantage  in her Iron Dames Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2, pitting just before the one-hour mark.

With the top four all pitting in unison, Ian James led the class in the Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo with his first stop still to make, ahead of Arnold Robin’s Akkodis ASP Lexus and Thomas Flohr’s AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3.

James Cottingham had been Bovy’s nearest challenger before bringing the No. 59 United Autosports McLaren 720s GT3 Evo into the pits, having earlier passed Ahmad Al Harthy’s No. 46 WRT BMW M4 GT3 at La Source.

The Yasser Shahin-driven Manthey EMA Porsche 911 GT3 R was third having also cleared Al Harthy prior to the first stops.