A damp, misty, cold day in Spa – very poor visibility for the early morning warm-up at 8.30 – just Jan and Jens driving in this short 20 minute session.

Jan started in the Storm LMP from 5th position on the grid on intermediate tyres – a fantastic start, passing the Nielsen Zytek on the start, then the Creation Zytek on the first lap, starting the second lap in third position.  After several laps he lost one place to the Creation car but kept a good lead over the Nielsen Zytek, the gap increasing and decreasing in the traffic.  Then Nielsen hit Jan hard from behind and a lap later passed him.

First pit stop and a change to slick tyres – Jan staying in the car.  Then a prolonged safety car period;  we chose not to make a stop during this time – several cars did and in the process lost a lap.  Jan came in for fuel on the same lap as the racing re-started and lost only 35 seconds. 

A secure 4th position and two stops made with the three cars in front all having to make a second pit stop long before our next scheduled stop.  Then Jan came across a Porsche which had just had a serious accident and had to drive across a lot of debris.  At the end of that lap he reported a gearbox problem and was straight into the pits.

The conclusion – probably the first incident with Nielsen but possibly the debris from the accident caused the problem in the gearbox and the Storm LMP retired after 2 ½ hours.

A very satisfying race for the team; although restricted by the regulations for the LMP900, the Storm was racing in the top four or five.  The new regulations favour the hybrid LMP1 which Laurence predicted – the Pescarolo was considerably faster than anything else.

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