A first lap axle failure forced Eurasia Motorsport into an early retirement from the Spa round of the European Le Mans Series.
Tristan Gommendy was driving the #33 ORECA-Nissan 05 on the opening lap of the four hour race when he spun unexpectedly at Bruxelles.
The rear-left wheel of the car then became detached, leaving Gommendy with no choice but to park up by the barriers.
“I’ve only seen it on the TV obviously, but it looks like some kind of stub axle failure,” explained LeSports by Eurasia Motorsport Team Principal Mark Goddard.
“We probably won’t even get the car back until after the race to know for certain, but it’s a concern not knowing for sure. Either way we’re out of the race on lap one and that’s never something I want to say.”
“In saying that, it’s a been a good weekend – up until that point anyway – Kevin (Pu Jun Jin) picked up the pace well after his incident at La Castellet and Nick (de Bruijn) was on his game.”
“There’s not much else to say other than we’ll be looking into the cause of the failure and we’ll then look forward to Portugal.”
The retirement will likely have a significant impact on Eurasia Motorsport’s bid for the LMP2 championship.
Before arriving in Belgium the team sat fourth in the standings, but this latest incident will mathematically end its chances of winning the title at the final round.
Two further incidents at the same spot on the exit of Bruxelles have resulted in lengthy barrier repairs.
Halfway through the second, Garry Findlay collided heavily with the armco in the Murphy Prototypes ORECA, before Remy Striebig did the same in the Pegasus Racing Morgan a few minutes after.
