Spa Classic

27th-29th May 2011

A new era

In the last weekend of May, Spa circuit saw the entry of the historic cars that unlike what has happened since last year, wasn’t concerning the RMU Classic, but a new Spa Classic organized by expert Patrick Peter. This event sponsored by the Royal Automobile Club de Belgique that has intended, after its merger with RMU made on 2 April 2009, to renew an exhibition which has been developing in the years around the participants but disregarding the context needed to draw spectators. Besides the exhibition on the circuit of Ardennes of fantastic vintage cars, Peter concentrated the race on entertainment events like activities devoted both to young and adult people. The adults were walking either in the area for the vintage cars on sale, or the old pits reserved on this occasion for Automobilia, The young could test their ability to drive the ACO small cars, at the wheel of which the luckiest took part at the Little Big Spa, on Saturday evening, by racing the part of the circuit from Bus stop to Eau Rouge, with a real start like Le Mans procedure. Always on Saturday there was the “caisse à Savon” cars, among which some vehicles, decidedly rudimentary, were set against refined single-seaters fitted with triangles placed over the four wheels. As a demonstration of such a high technology it’s necessary to point out the top speed of 104 km/h got on the bottom of the Eau Rouge (the track was run on the opposite way). As declared by Peter himself, the event will take place every year, going on to be presumably raced in May, due to the short period of the fine weather conditions in Belgium, and will have as a target to attract a progressive number of spectators to the races to let them admire the fantastic cars designed in the past, offering days devoted to races and entertainment: 10.000 spectators of this year have been a good visiting card.

Challenge ASAVE

Devoted to historic Touring and Gt cars for competition and production having raced and been homologated between 1947 and 1976, it has been the category with the bigger number of vehicles started off: 52 cars. Both practice and race were dominated by Terriou-Gary on the wheel of their Porsche 911 3.0.RSR, whose rate has immediately appeared unreachable.

Only in the first stages of the race their leadership was brought into discussion by duo Lange-Thibalt in Porsche 911 2.7RS, later finished second, and by Godfray in Chevrolet Corvette forced to retire at mid-race while he was fighting a thrilling duel against the future winners.

Challenge Asave

BOSS GP

Reserved for single-seaters which have raced on the circuits in the 80’s and 90’s, this category has taken part for the first time in an event organized by Peter Auto. It’s a fairly new reality, created with the involvement of some drivers who, after the bankruptcy which eliminated Euroboss at the beginning of 2010, were trying to repeat the earlier success, when at the starting off there were twenty participants. Besides, some interesting cars made their appearance on the track like a Jordan 191, the car driven by Schumacher for his debut in Formula 1just in Belgium, two Tyrrell 026, one of them powered European and the Prost 02 on which was mounted an excellent V10 Peugeot.

In the two scheduled races there was the fight between Van Kalmthout and Zwart, both at the wheel of the Benetton B197-Judd but while in race 1 a double puncture has given the victory to Zwar, in the second race Van Kalmthout moved from the ninth position thanks to an excellent start off which allowed him to attack his rival during the third lap: after a series of attempts failed in the La Source hairpin at three laps from the final which him lose contact with the rival, Van Kalmthout managed to defeat Zwart during the very last lap by an inside overtaking his rival on the Bus Stop chicane.

BOSS GP Race 1

BOSS GP Race 2

Trofeo Nastro Rosso

After the half-failure of Navarra, the category purposely created for the cars that were protagonists in the Shell Historic Challenge, has newly offered a first class show as it happened last year at Le Castellet. In paddocks it was possible to see again the ISO A3C and the Bizzarrini 5300 GT, one beside the other, together with the Maserati Birdcage, a good number of Ferraris 250 Europa and 275 GTB versions, the Istotta Rivalta IR300 and above all a very beauty and rare Ferrari 250 Europa Gt with a V12 “corto”, hidden under its bonnet, engine designed by Gioacchino Colombo. On practice the Birdcage took Pole position but on the third lap was forced to retire, leaving Gaye in his Ferrari 250G, Francioni, the Swiss banker, with his ISO A3C and Elrich in the Bizzarrini to fight for the win. The latter was obliged to slow down due to an engine problem, Francioni regained the lead but a few laps from the end he spun off coming out of Les Combes, allowing Gaye to gain an unexpected victory, while duo Singleton-Franklin gained the lowest place of podium.

The second race was rather monotonous with Gaye who limited to control Elrich in the first laps so as to fly to his second success of the weekend. Third place was gained by Gijzen with Ferrari 275 GTB, the winner of a hard duel with Ellerbrock in Alfa T2.

Nastro Rosso Race 1

Nastro Rosso Race 2

Sixties' Endurance

The category allowing the entry of the pre-66 GT cars and pre-63 Sports Cars, had thirty-eight cars on the starting off, a number lower than envisaged, but decidedly better than the few cars seen at Navarra. Among them there were many AC Cobras, the Jaguar Type E and Porsche 911, but also some rarer cars like the Aston Martin DBR4 Gt, the TVR Griffith and above all the Skoda Sport, early seen at the Historic Monaco. As usual the Cobras dominated this race with the TVR of McInerney only offering a certain resistance, third in a practice session during which Hugenholtz-Hart at the wheel of their brawny American car had ill-treated all the rivals. But in the race the rivals rolled up their sleeves, in fact, during the first 13 laps the crew made by Kicq-Alliot, always at the wheel of the AC Cobra, took the lead of the group, but later on had to retire due to technical problems. Thus the Pole men easily got the win, followed by TVR Griffith, with a gap of no less than 1 minute, and by the other AC Cobra of Caron.

Sixties' Endurance Race

Marco Zanello
Photos taken by Marco & Giacomo Zanello

Classic Endurance Racing: for the report about this category, click here.

Group C Racing: for the report about this category, click here.

Gallery

Challenge Asave

BOSS GP

Trofeo Nastro Rosso

Sixties' Endurance