Two Contending BMWs Eliminated in 12th-Hour Accident

Two of the front-running BMW M4 GT3s from Team WRT and ROWE Racing were eliminated from the CrowdStrike 24 Hours of Spa in an accident early in the 12th hour.

The No. 32 WRT machine driven by Charles Weerts and the No. 998 ROWE car of Neil Verhagen had contact on the Kemmel Straight during a battle for fifth position.

Onboard footage from Weerts’ car showed it being struck from behind and colliding with the right-side barrier before veering back across the track into the opposite barrier.

BMW M Motorsport stated that both drivers were OK after the high-speed collision, while the race director declared that barrier repairs would take around one hour.

WRT and ROWE Racing still each had a single BMW M4 GT3 left in the Pro class, although the No. 46 example from WRT was brought into its garage at the time of the crash after a reported incident involving Valentino Rossi and Uno Racing Audi driver ‘Rio’.

Weers told SRO TV pit lane reporter Ben Constanduros that he received notification of an upcoming Full Course Yellow period, whereas Verhagen did not and struck the back of the WRT car.

“A very confusing accident,” said Weerts. “I don’t know what happened with the other cars.

“I got information about a Full Course Yellow coming in. I don’t think Neil had [the same] information that I had.

“I tried to brake as late as possible and he was right behind me, and was not expecting me to brake for the Full Course Yellow. That’s how he hit me. Very confusing and I think some investigation needs to be done to understand why such a situation can happen.

“It’s a very dangerous situation for everybody: drivers, marshals, everybody. These kinds of situations cannot happen and we need to understand why it happened.”

Verhagen had been chasing Weerts for a spot in the overall top five shortly after a restart from the sixth safety car period of the race.

The safety car was attached to the seventh Full Course Yellow, which occurred after Colin Braun spun CrowdStrike Racing by Riley’s Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo at Campus.

Raffaele Marciello led at the restart after his Akkodis ASP team elected not to pit during the FCY.

All of the other front-runners came in, cycling Marciello to the head of the field and leaving the No. 98 ROWE Racing BMW of Philipp Eng in second.

The FCY appeared to help the Porsche 911 GT3 Rs from Manthey EMA and Rutronik Racing, both of which went off-strategy during a prior intervention period.

Manthey driver Kevin Estre overtook the No. 32 WRT BMW for the lead in the ninth hour but a missed opportunity to pit during an FCY caused it to make a time-consuming stop under green flag conditions.

“There was an FCY that lasted only one lap, which caught us out because the race director said he’s going to do two laps every time,” said Estre. “He did just one lap, so we could not pit on the second one.”

Manthey and Rutronik pitted under the FCY that spawned the sixth safety car, leaving them third and fourth respectively with Julian Andlauer and Thomas Preining.

After the BMW accident, multiple teams including Manthey EMA and Akkodis ASP took the lengthy FCY as an opportunity to perform their mandatory four-minute technical pit stops that include brake disk and pad changes.

The halfway mark passed under speed-restricted conditions, with Ricardo Feller leading in the Attempto Racing-run Tresor Orange 1 Audi which gained 12 points towards its Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS Endurance Cup haul.