Imola: Good start for Emil Frey Racing 🎥

The highlights of the three-hour race in three minutes. It wasn't just the weather that was hot, there was also a lot of heat on the track.

The biggest challenge for Emil Frey Racing on the first race weekend of the GT World Challenge Europe (formerly Blancpain GT Series) was getting used to the new Pirelli tires. The Safenwil-based team already mastered this quite well, putting both Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo cars in the top 12 in the heated race over three hours.

Crowd at the pits
46 cars from ten renowned manufacturers lined up on the grid at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari in Imola for the first Endurance race, where strict safety measures were in place due to Covid-19.

Frenchman Franck Perera made a solid start in car number #163 and positioned himself in tenth place. Several successive race interruptions followed due to various incidents, in which the Safenwil team was not involved.

However, luck was not on the side of the second crew with the #14 when it came to the pit stop during the second yellow phase. The tight space conditions in the pit lane caused a loss of time and threw the Lamborghini started by Norbert Siedler practically back to the end of the field (39th).

Encouraging outcome to a difficult start to the season
Giacomo Altoè improved to eighth position in his turn and Mikaël Grenier's recovery brought the second car up to P17. Unfortunately, a pit drive-through penalty for the car driven by Albert Costa Balboa at the end prevented a classification in the points. The Spaniard crossed the finish line in tenth place, but the subsequent 30-second penalty cost him eight positions.

With a strong performance, final runner Ricardo Feller brought the second Huracán home in twelfth place. If it hadn't been for two safety car phases that slowed him down, he would probably have finished even higher than eleventh, just outside the points.

After all, Emil Frey Racing was the best-placed Lamborghini team. The Technical Director therefore also drew an initial positive conclusion.

Jürg Flach: "Imola turned out to be a rather difficult race weekend. At the beginning, it wasn't easy to find a suitable set-up for the two cars. Nevertheless, we were able to achieve good placings thanks to good qualifying and race performance. We took the opportunity to continuously improve the cars and thus also make them competitive."

Altoè/Costa Balboa and Siedler/Grenier will contest the next event at Misano on August 8/9, where two one-hour sprint races will be held.

Delétraz scores on GT debut
Louis Delétraz's GT3 debut in one of GPX Racing's two Porsches went quite well. The Geneva native, who otherwise races in FIA Formula 2, came over the distance in ninth place with the two works drivers Romain Dumas - a Frenchman based in Arzier VD - and Thomas Preining from Austria. This earned him the first two points.

The all-Swiss team of Mauro Calamia, Ivan Jacoma and Roberto Pampanini finished 29th overall in their Dinamic Motorsport Porsche, which meant 7th place and six points in the Pro-Am category.

Lucas Mauron was unlucky. His Lamborghini was the victim of an accident with Alex Fontana through no fault of his own, before the St. Gallen driver, who was standing by, was able to take over the wheel in the middle of the race. The Ticino native, Lucas Légéret of French-speaking Switzerland and a Chilean brought their Mercedes over the laps after repairs in 38th and second-last place of all those classified.

Victory for Audi, podium for Marciello
Raffaele Marciello from Ticino, who was born in Zurich in December 1994, finished third overall in a Mercedes-AMG. "Lello" drives with a Swiss license but has been flying the Italian flag for many years.

Victory went to the Belgian Audi Club Team WRT with Kelvin van der Linde, Mirko Bortolotti and Matthieu Vaxivière. The Frenchman replaced Rolf Ineichen from Lucerne, who was prevented from attending on business, at short notice.

Imola overall classification Imola classes

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