The stewards was super busy evening, after the 4 hour European Le Mans Series race had been run at Autodromo Nazionale Monza.
Several of the decisions got quite a bit impact on the race result – which actually isn’t official yet.
Let’s take them bit by bit. Prema Racing #9 got a 10 second time penalty post race, since Ferdinand Habsburg had driven extremely slow at the pit entry. He was only doing 30 kph, which was seen as being dangerous. So their 10 seconds penalty pushes them away from the podium spot, and hands the trophies over to Mühlner Motorsport #21 with Thomas Laurent, Matthias Kaiser, and Ugo de Wilde, which is the first LMP2 podium for that outfit.
Nielsen Racing #7 got a 35 seconds time penalty for not doing the minimum pitstop time. There is a rule in the LMP3 category, that two pitstops needs to be at a certain length, while the others don’t have a minimum time. That ended up costing them a single position.
Photo: JJ Media
Eurointernational #11 was also under the minimum time, which gave them a 31 seconds time penalty. They were still able to keep their third place finish.
COOL Racing #27 got a 43 seconds time penalty for exactly the same. That didn’t cost them any positions either.
The big drama/controversy came around Iron Lynx Ferrari #60. The Italian team was disqualified from the race from the race, because they were pushed back to Parc Ferme by the sister car #83. The stewards see that as receiving outside assistance, which they believe is not legal. The exact reason for Davide Rigon needing that push from Rahel Frey is not known. Iron Lynx has protested the decision, so the race result is not final yet in the GTE category. If they get disqualified, it would elevate Proton Competition Porsche #77 to the win, ahead of Kessel Racing Ferrari #57, while Absolute Racing #18 with Andrew Haryanto, Martin Rump, and Alessio Piccariello potentially moves into third, which would be their first ELMS podium. But that will be decided in the coming days and weeks.
The stewards have plenty of time to make the final decision, since the next round is not held until the final week of August in Barcelona.
