Group C Racing – Spa Francorchamps
(Spa Classic)

Days of thunder

After the start of the championship at Donington for the Historic Festival, the Group C racing moved to the Spa circuit for the most impressive heat of all the championship. At the start of the weekend here the 25 cars among which two Mercedes C11’s and two Nissan R90C’s, but even a fantastic model of Lancia LC2, the C Group crated to confront the Porsche 956’s, recovered and brought to the track by Clevery.

Since practice it has been clear that fight for victory would be reserved for duo Berride-Glaesel, both at the wheel of Mercedes C11’s, decidedly faster than the other rivals. Pole went to the more expert English driver (with four participation in the 24 hours of Le Mans) with an incredible lap time of 2.05:295 but Glaesel too didn’t joke about the result by arriving only one second and eight less than the rival. Nissans’ were less successful with Kubota third but, with eight seconds less than Pole position, whilst Meyricks were impressive at the wheel of the Spice Se89c, even fourth at few tenths less than the Japanese: unfortunately they were unable to race after engine troubles.

On Sunday, 19 cars were lined up. The Mercedes cars have been taken the lead since the first laps with Berridge who seemed to be in a position to win easily, but after some rounds, the entry of the Safety car again gathered the group. On the new starting off of the race all drivers went back to pits for the mandatory pit-stop with Berridege coming out the pits and going on driving, even with a margin of few seconds: when five laps were separating from the end the English driver had to retire for the failure of the engine electronic system. Thus Glaesel could triumph with one minute less than Kubota, the author of a regular race, and in front of de Lesseps in the Spice SE90C, both favored by an early retirement of D’Ansembourg-Regout in a Porsche 962’s.

Marco Zanello
Photos taken by Giacomo and Marco Zanello

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