until Abu Dhabi Autonomous Racing League
Team Redline claimed a 1-2 in the iRacing 24 Hours of Spa with Maximilian Benecke, Patrik Holzmann and Jonas Wallmeier in the BMW Team Redline Red entry taking the win by 29 seconds over the sister BMW Team Redline Blue team.
BMW Team BS+COMPETITION finished in third and over a minute behind the winning team.
Max Verstappen, alongside Jeff Giassi and Gianni Vecchio, completed the race in fifth place in a Porsche, as the highest placed team not to be driving the BMW M4 GT3.
It was not a trouble free race for the current Formula 1 championship leader, as he had to jump into the car early after internet problems hit team-mate Giassi.
With six and a half hours of the race to go the Porsche24 by Redline team was running in fourth with Giassi behind the wheel, but a disconnection meant the car was sent back to the pitlane and Verstappen had to take over driving duties with the car down in seventh.
That meant their pitstop cycles were out of sync with the rest of the frontrunners and meant they had to do a splash and dash pitstop in the final 20 minutes of the race.
That final trip down the pitlane put Verstappen under pressure from Hendrik Kruse, racing for Biela Racing Euronics
Despite running on more worn tyres, Verstappen was able to keep track position over Kruse in the Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO.
Their battle appeared to be for sixth place but two penalties in the final hour of the race for BMW Team GB, one for speeding in the pitlane by Sami-Matti Trogen and the second for exceeding the incident point limit, meant Verstappen and his two team-mates were promoted up to fifth place in the final finishing order as BMW Team GB dropped from fifth to seventh.
What a show! 🤩
Incredible display of defensive driving by @Max33Verstappen in the last couple of laps, amazing to watch 👏#Porsche24 @PorscheNL pic.twitter.com/XPwf5vLNjo
— Team Redline (@TeamRedlineSim) July 25, 2021
The iRacing 24 Hours of Spa was Verstappen’s fourth appearance in an iRacing special event this year, having previously won both the iRacing Bathurst 12 Hour and Nurburgring 24 Hours.
The other event he took part in was the iRacing 24 Hours of Daytona where he was racing alongside fellow real-world racing driver Dani Juncadella. However the pair retired from that race early on after sustaining damage to their car.
