4 HOURS OF SPA - UP & DOWN, FROM POLE, TO P4, TO P3

Good afternoon! How did you spend your weekend? Mine was great, on Sunday I attended the races of TCR Europe and GT Open in Monza. Thanks to Matilde, Miloš Pavlović’s wife, I managed to obtain a pass for the paddock and I had the pleasure to follow GT Open race from the box of Bonaldi Motorsport. But this doesn’t mean I forgot about Lou’s ELMS race in Spa, and here I am to tell you a few words about it. 

Thanks to Salih Yoluc, Racing Team Turkey obtained the pole position. Unfortunately, at the beginning of the race, Manuel Maldonado (yes, Pastor’s cousin, you surely remember him on Pastor’s shoulders during the 2012 fire in Barcelona, right after the Venezuelan driver’s maiden win) caused a crash with another car, and safety car made its entrance on track. Lou and his crew ended the race P4, but, after the race, Alessio Rovera, Mathieu Vaxiviere and François Perrodo (AF Corse) got a penalty for accelerating too early at the restart after the end of the yellow flag, making Racing Team Turkey switch to P3.

The next (and final!) ELMS race will be on October 21st and 22nd in Portimao. Who will become the champion? You will discover it on these pages!

6 HOURS OF FUJI - BIG IN JAPAN!

Konnichi-wa 🙏🏻 Welcome to Japan, one of my favourite countries ever! I may have already written about it on this blog, but I love Japan for its millenary culture and traditions, its delicious and healthy food and the kindness and politeness of people! And yes, it’s okay to admit it, I love Japanese car manufacturers and racing drivers too. And you can easily imagine how happy I am for the win of the FIA WEC championship Toyota obtained on the Fuji Speedway, after a tumultuous race fighting with a Porsche. Japanese fans were amazed, they have a great love for their cars and drivers as well as a big respect for “rivals”, which is a quality I admire a lot.

Lou had a good time in the days before the race, strolling around Tokyo with Nobu Matsushita (his former Formula 2 teammate) and visiting hedgehog cafés. And, along with his teammates RobKub and Rui, he won in the LMP2 classification, incrementing the chances to seize the LMP2 title! 

WEC will be back on November 4th in Sakhir, for the final act of the 2023 season! See you 👋🏻