24h Le Mans
Racing Team Turkey clinched its maiden European Le Mans Series win with the #34 Oreca 07-Gibson at the 4 Hours of Barcelona, the first round of the 2023 season.
Racing Team Turkey, the reigning LMP2 Pro/Am champions, got their defence of the title off to a flying start in the opening round of the 2023 European Le Mans Series. Salih Yoluç, Charlie Eastwood and Louis Delétraz took the honours in the #34 Oreca 07-Gibson at the 4 Hours of Barcelona.
Duqueine Team’s Neel Jani took over the lead in the #30 Oreca as Delétraz was forced to pit to change a rear-end clip. However, the Swiss racer regained top spot in a dramatic finale and clinched the Turkish outfit’s maiden win. “It’s great to get an overall win and it’s a big step for Racing Team Turkey,” Yoluç said afterwards. “We had a pretty flawless race until towards the end. I think we’ve done a good job with the whole team.”
In LMP3, a 105-second penalty incurred post-race by Racing Spirit of Leman’s #31 Ligier JS P320-Nissan pushed the team down to third place, behind Cool Racing’s #17 Ligier and the #13 Ligier of Inter Europol Competition.
The #16 Porsche 911 RSR-19 of Proton Competition edged out Formula Racing in the LMGTE class. Former ELMS champion Alessio Picariello brought the car home just 1.4 seconds ahead of the #50 Ferrari 488 GTE Evo.
The final result of the 2023 4 Hours of Barcelona can be found here.
You can see highlights of the race in the video below.
With the European Le Mans Series taking a break until the 4 Hours of Le Castellet on 16 July, some of the teams will now turn their focus to the 24 Hours of Le Mans Centenary (10-11 June 2023).
