After a delayed start – by virtue of the stranded #44 Ibanez Racing Oreca of Yutaka Yamagishi on the formation lap - the no38 Jota Sport Gibson Nissan of Harry Tincknell got the jump early, ahead of Mark Patterson (Murphy Prototypes Oreca) and Leo Roussel (#29 Pegasus Racing Morgan and Bjorn Wirdheim (#41 Greaves Motorsport Gibson).
Eventual victor Pierre Thiriet (#46 Oreca 05 ) started the race in 9th place in the but
soon started to make progress up the field and by lap 8 the Frenchman driver was battling for 2nd.
On lap 19 the safety car was deployed to rescue a stricken GT at Tamburello. Harry Tincknell was forced to defend his now reduced advantage and set about rebuilding his lead ahead of the Thiriet TDS Racing Oreca.
Tincknell handed over to Simon Dolan at the 90-minute mark, emerging 12-seconds
ahead of the (#46 Oreca 05, but 20 minutes later, the Villorba Corse LMP3 Ginetta ran out of fuel exiting Rivazza, triggering the second safety car of the race just as Dolan was forced off track negotiating GT traffic - dislodging part of the left front bodywork in the process. The resulting pit-stop to repair the damage effectively snuffed out their challenge for outright honours.
This left Tristen Gommendy to hold his
advantage over Nathanael Berthon in the Murphy Oreca.
“I did a mistake this morning in the qualifying session. But my two team mates did a great job”, said Gommendy. “During the race, the car was perfect. We degraded the tyres only a little and even when I pushed hard they were still good.”
The LMGTE class however were the stars of the show, with the leading four drivers covered by never more than mere seconds during the final 2 hours. Alessandro Pier Guidi took the win in the no56 AT Racing Ferrari after a great recovery drive after dropping down the field at the start and being tapped into a spin by the no3 Team LNT Ginetta of Charlie Robertson.
Silverstonevictors Charlie Robertson and Chris Hoy started the race from pole, however a penalty and technical issues dropped the Scot down the field handing the advantage to the no15 SVK by Speed Factory Ginetta and the no7 University of Bolton Ginetta Nissan of Rob Garofall and Morten Dons.
The GTC podium fell to AF Corse with Stuart Hall taking the win in the no62 Ferrari 458 ahead of teammates in the no63 and no64 cars to secure an Italian trifecta.
TDS punches back at Imola
Images: ELMS Series