LMP @ 6 Hours of Spa-francorchamps 2019
The 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps was the penultimate round in the 2018/19 WEC season with Le Mans 24 Hours culminating the year.
When I arrived at Francorchamps, it looked more like a ski resort than a circuit. The temperature was around 1 degree and snow was packed up in several places. The decision was made however to go ahead in the hope that the track temperature would reach the required minimum of 5 degrees.
Because of the low temperature, the race was delayed by 26’, but the grid procession took place as usual, this time in winter clothing as you can see in the pics.
The flying man could still make his show...
The 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps could start on a clean, dry track, but the dark clouds looked not very promising and we were expecting … a change to say the least!
Rebellion #3 passed 2nd in a storm of snow.
Only 15 minutes after the start Conway, the pole man, was quickly under snow…
The #11 SMP Racing car of Stoffel Vandoorne, Mikhail Aleshin and Vitaly Petrov leads the #1 Rebellion Racing R-13 shared by Bruno Senna, André Lotterer and Neel Jani in the first but not last snowstorm.
Buemi with his TOYOTA GAZOO Racing #8 makes it carefully through in P3 at 13:43.
It was so cold that my hands were freezing and I just had to stop shooting.
The race went as weather conditions cycled between clear and sunny to wet and windy as virtually every form of water fell from the skies: rain, snow, sleet, hail …
The pole-sitting #7 TOYOTA GAZOO Racing car of Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Jose Maria "Pechito" Lopez led comfortably until …
just before the half-distance they had to pit. They lost 11-minutes and four laps in the pits because of a sensor problem on their hybrid system that had to be repaired.
Following a number of safety cars (here at 19:00 ½ before end of race timing) as conditions flitted between wet and dry, the race was stopped with just 10 minutes left to run. The #8 TOYOTA GAZOO Racing Europe of Kazuki Nakajima, Sébastien Buemi and Fernando Alonso won the race.
The #3 Rebellion Racing R-13 shared by Gustavo Menezes, Thomas Laurent and Nathanael Berthon took second place overall after a close battle with the #11 SMP Racing car of WEC debutant Stoffel Vandoorne and his teammates Mikhail Aleshin and Vitaly Petrov.
The #11 SMP Racing car of Stoffel Vandoorne and his teammates Mikhail Aleshin and Vitaly Petrov finished 3rd.
The #17 SMP car of Sergey Sirotkin, Stephane Sarrazin and Egor Orudzhev placed 4th after its race was affected by a lost wheel in the second hour.
The #1 Rebellion Racing R-13 shared by Bruno Senna, Andre Lotterer and Neel Jani took 5th place overall 3 laps behind the leader.
The pole-sitting #7 TOYOTA GAZOO Racing car of Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Jose María "Pechito" Lopez could only end up 6th.
