#72 SMP Racing Ferrari 488 GT3 won the second round of Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup after a late pass by Davide Rigon on Orange 1 FFF Racing's Lamborghini Huracan GT3 driven by Giovanni Venturini.
Update: #74 RAM Racing Mercedes lost it's victory after race control found the Mercedes to be colliding with #52 AF Corse Ferrari, leaving it with damage. The regular drive-through penalty was converted into 30 seconds time penalty with Niek Hommerson, Louis Machiels and Andrea Bertolini now winning the race in #52 Ferrari.
It marks the Italian manufacturer's first win since 2013 when Kessel Racing took victory at Monza with Rigon as a part of their driver lineup.
The race got underway at 3:00 pm local time as Lamborghinis led a 1-2-3 with polesitting #63 Grasser Racing Lamborghini of Christian Engelhart leading the #519 and #563 Orange 1 FFF Lamborghinis of Franck Perera and Dennis Lind.
Less than 5 minutes into the race, all hell broke loose as #26 Sainteloc Racing Audi of Nyls Stievenart spun across the track. As he gained control on his car and started driving slowly, several cars collected him, resulting in several retirements including #488 Rinaldi Racing of Pierre Ehret, #59 Garage 59 Aston Martin of Come Ledogar and #88 AKKA ASP of Michael Meadows.
After almost half an hour period of safety car, the race resumed. The Lamborghini kept their 1-2-3 positions with #55 Attempto Racing Audi ane #107 Bentley Team M-Sport completing the Top 5 overall.
Down the order, Shae Davies (#17 WRT Audi) was penalised after he had a contact with #108 Bentley of Alex Buncombe, with the #108 at the back of the pack till the end.
With 35 minutes completed, Jordan Pepper finally found an opportunity to overtake the Audi of Pieter Schothorst after a strong defense by the Audi driver.
With 53 minutes completed, #63 Grasser Racing Team suffered a left-rear puncture at Turn 1. The leader came into pits and returned to track a lap down, with slim chances of a win.
#563 Lamborghini of Dennis Lind quickly took the lead with Orange 1 FFF having a 1-2. The leader pitted soon afterwards with a driver change but proved disappointing as Full Course Yellows were waved to clear the track as #444 HB Racing Ferrari spun and stopped in the gravel trap.
#519 Lamborghini with Perera then entered the pitlane during the course of Full Course Yellows and handed over the car to Phil Keen to be promoted to the lead.
After a couple of minutes, Safety Car came out for a brief period as the race resumed with 1 hour and 40 minutes on the clock.
As the race was resumed, #72 SMP Racing of Miguel Molina battled for 2nd place with Ezequiel Perez Companc in #2 WRT Audi, gaining the place with the Audi dropping as low as fifth as Companc lost the pace and struggled.
After half the race distance, #555 Lamborghini exited the pitlane as #97 Oman Racing Aston Martin touched the #555 Lamborghini of Taylor Proto, sending Proto to the barriers with a massive crash that destroyed the front end of the car. Gladly, Taylor Proto walked away with little injuries as Full Course Yellow was triggered.
With just over an hour to go, the race was resumed as Andrea Caldarelli in #563 Lamborghini quickly made a move on Molina, passing him to take the second place as Molina was demoted to third with Lamborghini leading 1-2.
Final pitstops were resumed with 50 minutes left as Giovanni Venturini took the lead in #519 Lamborghini.
Davide Rigon took over the #72 SMP Racing and edged closer to the Venturini for several laps.
With lead battles emerging tense and breathtaking, several passes were made by the cars across all classes, with #98 ROWE Racing Porsche handled by Mathieu Jaminet making as much as 35 overtakes to make it to 6th place after a difficult opening to the race that saw the car having a puncture.
As the race went on, Rigon found pace lap-by-lap with Venturini slowly cracking under the pressure, running wide and aggressively defending from the more experienced factory Ferrari driver. Behind the two was Jack Hawksworth, claiming the third place in #43 Strakka Mercedes after passing Marco Mapelli.
Venturini continued to defend but made a mistake into Luffield with 17 minutes to go, as #72 SMP Racing quickly took the lead with Rigon building the gap.
Behind Rigon, Venturini now had to defend from Hawksworth and Mapelli.
The race started turning chaotic for third and forth placed drivers, as Mapelli made contact with Hawksworth, as Hawksworth spin while Mapelli receiving damage on his car. Between the drama, Dries Vanthoor took #2 WRT Audi to 3rd after an astonishing drive.
As the chequered flags were waved, Rigon came home first with over 2.6s lead from Venturini. Vanthoor made the final place on overall podium ahead of #98 ROWE Racing Porsche. Hawksworth overtook Mapelli to take 4th place after tucking in the back of the Italian.
Silver Cup victory was handed over to Mattia Drudi after a stellar weekend all along with #74 RAM Racing Mercedes winning the race in Pro-Am category. #77 Barwell Motorsport took victory in the Am class with Miguel Ramos in the final stint.
The team championship is now led by the Black Falcon team over Orange 1 FFF Racing with Akka ASP in third place.
Reigning Endurance Cup champions lead the drivers' championship with Maro Engel and Luca Stolz leading from Andrea Caldarelli and Marco Mapelli.
Next race is 6 Hours of Paul Ricard later this month, as a preparation towards the championship's crown jewel race at Spa in July.
Adam Weller and DSC contributed to this article.
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