Within both of those classes were of course two Aston Martin Valkyries and two Aston Martin Racing Vantage cars and their crews as all looked to continue the upward trend in performance results from their new Hypercar stead as well as recouping upon lost ground with their LMGT3 runners after the disappointment of Imola last time out.
That all started again on Thursday with two Free Practice sessions before going into Qualifying later on Friday that saw the #007 and #009 Heart of Racing Hypercars again struggle for that single lap pace compared to how both figured during the longer runs of the Free Practice sessions. Both AMR Vantage LMGT3 showed great early pace and both the #27 Heart of Racing, and #10 Racing Spirit of Leman crews progressed into Hyperpole with the latter crew of Derek DeBoer, Eduardo Barrichello (with Valentin Hasse-Clot) scooping the headlines of their stablemates with a P2 qualifying position over that of a P6 for the #27 car of Ian James, Zacharie Robichon (with Mattia Drudi).
A later early afternoon race start than last time saw the full thirty-six strong grid taking to the start in front a record crowd despite some sizeable off’s for some in the earlier sessions.
Initial laps saw both Vantage crews lose ground within class whilst both Valkyries of Harry Tincknell/Tom Gamble (#007) and Marco Sorensen/Alex Riberas (#009) saw easy pickings as one Porsche spun at Les Combes, and another suffered technical issues as the same place on the circuit as the Hypercar class began to lap the LMGT3 tailenders after just fifteen minutes.
A quick succession of intervention saw the race neutralised in places as the earlier Porsche stopping was covered under a Full Course Yellow but a LMGT3 stopped along the Kemmel Straight warranted the use of a Virtual Safety Car and Safety Car restart with the issuing of penalties to some for breach of start line and FCY procedures also lifting both the #27 to P5 and the #10 to P9 at the end of the first hour.
At the start of the second hour, the #27 of James had briefly assumed the lead in class whilst the #007 was leading the #009 up to P14 and P16 respectively with both Valkyries showing a race pace equal to at least half of their competitors this time around, something that will still need improvement though going into the 24 Hours of Le Mans next time out in June.
Barrichello came into the #10 car, and he was soon embroiled in a battle with the #81 Corvette whilst James finished off his double stint with a dice with the #88 Mustang before he handed over to Robichon for the middle stint before the race again came under the control of the Safety Car after a heavy impact for the #95 McLaren at Les Combes after earlier contact with a Mercedes.
After a thirty-minute delay, the race went back to green but that was again thwarted after the #10 car of Barrichello came into side-to-side contact with the remaining McLaren to push that car into the protective barrier and to give himself a puncture for his efforts. Further ‘pain’ from that incident came with a later imposed 10 second time penalty to compound an earlier drive through penalty for an unsafe release.
Going into the final seventy-five minutes of the race, both Pro drivers were now aboard each Vantage LMGT3 with distinct missions to lift their crews up from their mid-table positions by the end. Both Valkyrie’s were still circulating, as high a P4 on pace for the faster of the two of them in the #007 with both crews still ticking off those performances improvement boxes as they went.
There was to be no fairytale P4 finish for the #007 though as the inevitable final splash and dash dropped them back down towards the rear of the pack with the same effect being imposed upon the #27 car of Drudi as they too completed their final stop.
Under diminishing sun, the six hours of Spa finally came to a close at 20:00hrs local with the two Valkyries getting their best results of their debut FIA WEC season so far in P13 and P14 respectively for the #007 and #009 cars whilst the #27 and #10 Vantage’s also followed each other home in P5 and P6 in class for a handful more Championship points.
Next time out will be at the Circuit de La Sarthe in June.