ELMS @ 4 Hours of Monza 2021
Qualifications
First pole this season for Franco Colapinto driving G-Drive Racing Aurus #26 at Monza. It is the second consecutive qualification win for the team after the Nick De Vries pole at Le Castellet. Rusinov will start on pole tomorrow at 11 am for the 4 hours of Monza, the 4th race of the 2021 Season.
Johnathan Aberdein is second on United Autosports #22 and Louis Deletraz 3rd with Team WRT #41.
Ben Hanley is overall 4th and the fastest of the Pro-Am runners in the #21 Dragonspeed USA Oreca.
In LMP3, the only Duqueine-Nissan dominated all the Ligier in the run as Laurents Hörr went to the head of the class with #4 DKR Engineering. Matthieu De Barbuat co-driving the #4 car will start his first ELMS race on pole! Ugo De Wilde with #13 Inter Europol Competition Ligier was 2nd and Gerett Grist in the #20 Team Virage Ligier 3rd.
The LMGTE class was dominated by Alessadro Pier Guidi, who replaced Matt Griffin on Spirit of Race #55 Ferrari 488 GTE EVO. The #95 TF Sport Aston Martin Vantage was 3rd quickest with Ross Gunn.
The Race
Start of the 2021 4 Hours of Monza. Rusinov (#26 G-Drive Racing Aurus-Gibson) keeps the lead in front of Phil Hanson (#22 United Autosports Oreca) and Yifei Ye (#41 Orlen Team WRT Oreca).
The quartet of 4 leaders remained within 1 sec. behind Rusinov, who finally gave up to Phil Hanson (#22) and a bit later to Yifei Ye (#41).
That seemed to be the order until Christian Ried went into the gravel causing an FCY. United Autosport made a smart move by calling Hanson back to the pit while others had to follow the safety car. Rusinov with G-Drive #26 lost definitively any chance of podium, after running out of fuel at the end of the last lap after the safety car and getting a penalty for not respecting distances when following the safety car.
Rino Mastronardi (#80 iron Lynx Ferrari 488 GTE Evo) takes over Duncan Cameron (#55 Spirit of Race Ferrari 488 GTE Evo) after François Perrodo (#88 AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE Evo) took the lead from the #55 pole Ferrari. Perrodo would lose the lead a few laps later with Mastronardi taking the lead.
First victory for the #65 Panis Racing team Oreca 07 in the European Le Mans Series today at the 4 Hours of Monza.
Julien Canal started 8th on the grid but rose to 2nd before the end of the 1st hour, after pit stops during the safety car period caused by the WeatherTech-Proton Porsche 911 RSR-19, which spun into the gravel.
James Allen took the lead after 90’ during the round of stops held during the FCY.
The team then kept the lead for the rest of the race with Will Stevens capturing a long-awaited first victory for the Panis Racing Team.
Tom Gamble, Jonathan Aberdein and Phil Hanson in the # 22 United Autosports Oreca finished 2nd even though taking the lead from pole car #26 between the 2nd and 3rd half-hour of the race.
JOTA completed the podium with the Jafaar Jaseman (#82 Oreca) resisting to the assaults of Louis Deletraz (#41 Team WRT).
The # 25 G-Drive crew (Roberto Merhi, Rui Andrade and John Falb) came away with the Pro-Am sub-category win.
Laurents Hoerr and Mathieu de Barbuat driving the #4 DKR Duqueine D08 Nissan won the LMP3 class, in front of Wayne Boyd, Rob Wheldon and Edouard Cauhaupe in United Autosports’ # 2 Ligier JS P320 Nissan.
In GTE class, Alessandro Pier Guidi made the difference for the full season drivers of the #55 Spirit of Race Ferrari 488 GTE Evo, David Perel and Duncan Cameron, who won the class. Ferrari dominated the class with the six Ferraris in GTE finishing first through sixth.
Sorry for the poor quality of the photo’s. Due to pandemic we had to follow the race on YouTube and get those instants on an iPad.
