Greaves win bad-tempered European Le Mans Series opener at Silverstone

Greaves Motorsport took victory in a thrilling season opener that was overshadowed by a controversial move on the TDS Racing Oreca which resulted in contact. James Newbold reports.

What a shame that it all came down to this. The first round of the 2015 European Le Mans Series was a true classic, but will sadly be remembered for all the wrong reasons.

The mood in the press conference afterward ought to have been celebratory. Gibson turned in a remarkable 1-2 finish, while TDS made the podium on the first time out with their new Oreca 05. But instead, tension bristled as Tristan Gommendy described from his perspective the contact at Aintree corner with Greaves driver Jon Lancaster, which removed TDS from victory contention with a mere five minutes of the race remaining, demoting the French squad to an unhappy third.

Gommendy did not mince his words. 

“From my side it was pretty simple; it took place where it was impossible to overtake,” said Gommendy, who shared with Pierre Thiriet and Ludovic Badey. “It was an interesting move. If we have the same spirit in the Le Mans race, I think we can have a big trouble, and injuries to drivers. It’s not in the spirit of endurance. I was once young like him, but never did I do that. If you are a good driver, you don’t have to do that. You don’t need to do that. It’s a shame for him.”

Greaves won, but TDS were furious (ELMS)

Despite the protests of TDS and much to the relief of the Greaves squad, no further action was taken after the race. But it was a sour way to end a breathtaking day’s racing.

After a solid double stint from Gary Hirsch, Bjorn Wirdheim had built up a healthy gap for Greaves over Jota’s Simon Dolan during the race’s middle stint, only for the arrival of the safety car with just over an hour to go for a collision between two GTC cars to seemingly scupper his plans. That brought Gommendy back into play in the TDS Oreca, and after Wirdheim’s tyres passed their best, Gommendy was able to build a commanding lead. But if he thought a 14-second gap was enough, then he had reckoned without Lancaster, who had earlier qualified on pole and was driving the race of his life.

After taking over from Wirdheim, Lancaster fought a stoic rear-guard action against surprise Jota returnee Harry Tincknell for much of his stint. Although the newly-signed Nissan LMP1 driver managed to capitalise on traffic to briefly get past, Lancaster refused to let him out of his sights and managed to execute an audacious pass into the Maggots-Becketts complex, causing an irate Tincknell to spin in avoidance. 

With much fresher tyres, Lancaster was then able to reign in the gap to Gommendy and with five minutes to go, the stage was set for a grandstand finale. It didn’t disappoint. Traffic once again played its part, delaying Gommendy enough through the Loop to allow Lancaster to get a run to his inside through Aintree. The two made the slightest of touches at the apex, but it was enough to unsettle the Oreca, which slid across the track and narrowly avoided making contact with the barriers.

TDS ran promisingly on the Oreca's first outing (ELMS)

“He had a really bad exit with a lot of wheelspin, and I had good traction, we still had a little bit of tyre left,” said the Yorkshireman. “There was a small gap and I got halfway down the inside, he left a little bit of room but not quite enough; I hit the inside kerb and we’ve just glanced him on the way out, but his tyres were that far gone that any sort of contact was going to send him into a bit of a spin. It’s unfortunate, but I think it was a racing incident at the end of the day.”

But it still wasn’t over; with a charging Tincknell looming ever-larger in his mirrors, Lancaster had to endure an anxious final few laps – not helped by a near-miss with Dan Brown’s GTC Lamborghini at Copse – but a final lap showdown was not to be, the two separated at the line by just 0.370s.

“It was more stressful out of the car than in the car!” said a plainly relieved Hirsch.

Jota were plainly disappointed with second after coming so close to victory, but with the painful memories of 2014 still fresh, they could at least be glad of putting some solid points on the board.

“Okay we would have liked to be first, and on balance we had the pace to be first, but what’s pleasing to us is the chassis; it’s a few years old now and you’re always expecting one of the shiny new coupes to come in and be a couple of seconds per lap quicker, but they’re fundamentally not,” said Jota’s Simon Dolan. “On balance it’s not a bad result, but perhaps not the one we felt we deserved, although I’m sure all the other guys will say the same!”

Jota fell narrowly short again (ELMS)

With electrical problems accounting for Murphy Prototypes, who had been set for a strong finish to the race with Nathaniel Berthon at the wheel, two series debutants rounded out the top five, with Krohn Racing’s Ozz Negri, Tracy Krohn and Niclas Jonsson heading home Eurasia Motorsport duo of Pu Jun Jin and Nick de Bruijn in fourth and fifth.

Little had been expected of the five-car LMP3 entry, with Lanan Racing only receiving their brand-new car on Thursday night, but all five made it to the finish, with Charlie Robertson and Sir Chris Hoy taking the spoils for Team LNT ahead of team-mates Michael Simpson and Gaetan Paletou. After being sent to the back of the grid for a technical infringement, Ginetta GT4 Supercup-graduate Robertson was fortunate to emerge from turn one unscathed as Jonathan Coleman and Kirill Ladygin spun in front of the pack, but thereafter set about working his way through the order, giving Hoy a clear lead to manage before returning to the cockpit for the final half an hour.

“I was working on getting my tyres warm when I thought ‘wait a minute, there’s 40 roughly cars going into turn one so it’s going to be carnage,’ so I held back a little bit going across the line and right enough there were P2 cars parked across the track and a few corners later there were GT cars all over the place; it was a little bit lairy!” Robertson reported. “I just managed to pick my way through it and focus on getting past the other LMP3 cars before the safety car came out. That helped because it didn’t really cost us anything, it just bunched everyone up again and then just got through to the lead of the class within the first 20 minutes, then it was all about pulling out a lead to hand over to Chris and he drove really sensibly. It’s an honour to compete in the first race for them and to win it was just amazing.”

Elsewhere in GTE, Gulf Racing took a first victory with their Porsche 911 RSR GTE, which debuted at the final round at Paul Ricard last season. Despite only qualifying fifth, as Adam Carroll struggled to find the right balance in the cold conditions, the combination of a stellar opening double-stint from Phil Keen and the fortuitous timing of the safety car during Michael Wainwright’s middle stint gave the Milton Keynes outfit a clear lap’s advantage over the JMW Motorsport Ferrari of impressive BTCC convert-Sam Tordoff, George Richardson and Robert Smith in second.

Andy Prialux and Marc VDS narrowly missed the GTE podium (ELMS)

“The car worked really well, we had a bit of a scary start with so many cars going off, but everything went like clockwork really. It was easy to drive and it was pretty straightforward,” said Keen.

Matt Griffin also struggled badly in qualifying with a braking problem that cost him seven tenths in the middle sector alone, but he, Aaron Scott and Duncan Cameron were still able to recover to third in the race ahead of the Marc VDS BMW of Andy Prialux, Jesse Krohn and Henri Hassid, which served a stop-go penalty for overtaking under yellows. Regular partners Griffin and Cameron will also be competing in tomorrow’s Blancpain Endurance Series meeting at Monza and were set to fly immediately after the race ended.

“We’ll go straight into qualifying as far as I know; that will be tough because Monza is not an easy place to go and fire out a lap straightaway,” said the Irishman after qualifying.

In GTC, Franck Perera, Dino Lunardi and Eric Dermont took the spoils for TDS Racing after their chief rivals, the no. 63 AF Corse Ferrari, were eliminated in a crash with the Massive Motorsport Aston Martin.