Lionspeed Porsche Wins Eventful Magny-Cours Sprint Cup Race 2

The Lionspeed GP Porsche of Ricardo Feller and Bastian Buus scored a second win of the GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS Sprint Cup season after taking victory in a restarted second Magny-Cours contest.

The No. 80 Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo qualified fourth and, despite being frustrated behind the Eastalent Racing Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II of Christopher Haase in the opening stint, it was able to vault into the lead during the round of stops, eventually defeating the No. 30 Silver Cup WRT BMW M4 GT3 EVO by 2.120 seconds.

The No. 007 Comtoyou Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo of polesitter Nicki Thiim led the early stages but was immediately in trouble with officials and was handed a ten-second penalty for an out-of-position start as Thiim failed to run over the grid slots as the race began.

Thiim therefore immediately set about trying to pull clear of the No. 59 Garage 59 McLaren 720S GT3 Evo of Marvin Kirchhoefer, who had jumped into second at the start.

Thiim’s hopes of negating the worst effects of the penalty were boosted by Haase keeping Feller bottled up in the battle for third as the pack soon began falling adrift of the top two.

But the No. 007’s ambitions of still securing a strong result were dashed when the race was red-flagged just before the pit window opened after Dustin Blattner’s Kessel Ferrari 296 GT3 Evo was sent hard into the barriers approaching the Adelaide Hairpin following contact from Rinat Salkikov’s Winward Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo as they battled for the Bronze Cup lead.

There was a 30-minute delay while barriers were repaired and the track was cleared before the race resumed with two laps behind the safety car.

The pit window then opened with the Silver and Bronze cars stopping first and this enabled Silver pacesetter, the No. 30 WRT BMW, to catapult up the overall order.

Thiim waited as long as he could before stopping to try to pull a gap but Kobe Pauwels had to rejoin down in 17th after the penalty was served.

But it was not the Garage 59 McLaren that assumed the lead as a slow stop instead handed the advantage to Buus in the Lionspeed Porsche with Matisse Lismont second in the No. 30 BMW.

From there it was an untroubled rest of the race for Buus as he took the flag comfortably clear of the Lismont and Ignacio Montenegro BMW, which claimed a fourth Silver Sprint Cup win of the season.

The No. 50 AF Corse Ferrari of Thomas Neubauer was another to benefit from slower stops for others as he resumed in third, but faced pressure from the No. 96 Rutronik Racing Lamborghini Temerario GT3 of Luca Engstler that was enjoying its strongest outing to date in the series.

This pressure told with just under ten minutes to go when Neubauer ran wide at Turn 3 and Engstler was eventually able to edge ahead on the inside of the Adelaide Hairpin to seal the final spot on the podium in the Lamborghini he shared with Patric Niederhauser.

The Neubauer and Arthur Leclerc Ferrari had to settle for fourth, while fifth was the repaired Eastalent Audi that crashed out of the opening race of the weekend.

A strong rearguard action from James Kell netted him and Arthur Rougier sixth place overall in the No. 111 CSA McLaren and also a first Gold Cup win of the season.

Dean Macdonald therefore had to settle for seventh in the No. 59 McLaren that ran so strongly with Kirchhoefer earlier in the race.

It was a nightmarish day for the overall points leaders Kelvin van der Linde and Charles Weerts as first the No. 32 WRT BMW was stripped of pole for using too much boost before van der Linde then retired early in the race after contact with Peter Dempsey’s Ziggo Sport Tempesta Porsche broke the front suspension.

But none of the WRT crew’s main rivals were able to significantly profit as Race 1 winners Dani Juncadella and Jules Gounon were only eighth in the 2 Seas Mercedes-AMG.

Meanwhile, the Winward Mercedes-AMG of Maro Engel and Lucas Auer again lost vital time during its pit stop and was only 19th at the flag.

It seemed like no-one wanted to win the Bronze Cup class as Salikhov was given a 20-second stop-and-hold penalty for his part in Blattner’s accident, while Dempsey earlier needed to pit from the class lead to change a tire after the van der Linde contact at the Adelaide Hairpin.

This meant the Paradine Competition BMW of Darren Leung and Augusto Farfus triumphed for the first time this season in 23rd overall, despite Leung being spun early in the race.

RESULTS: Race 2