The 24 Hours of Spa endurance race was a very tense one for Bentley but, even so, both of its Continental GT3 cars managed to finish within the top 20.
It was the debut for the car in 24-hour races at the fourth round of the Blancpain Endurance Series and, indeed, both reliability and pace were confirmed during this race.
Yet the start of the race was not the most hopeful looking as both cars sustained damage and had to make unscheduled pit stops during the first two hours.
The cars started off in sixth and 38th positions but after the incidents early on, the drivers had to work hard to regain their standings from 50th and 55th places respectively.
By the end of the race, car #7 had managed to make to back to 13th position, driven by Guy Smith, Andy Meyrick and Steven Kane. Meanwhile, car #8 finished in 17th place, following hard work by Jerome D’Ambrosia, Duncan Tappy and Antoine Leclerc.
What’s more, the drivers of car #7 managed to gain three championship points, which goes towards their bid to become champion drivers of the Endurance Series.
Speaking after the race, member of the board for engineering at Bentley Rolf French said: “I’m satisfied with our performance here this weekend as it was the first time a Continental GT3 has had to endure such extreme racing. For both cars to finish successfully is a credit to the skill and teamwork on display within Bentley Motorsport.”
He added that a lot of data was gathered from the race, which showed on the one hand that the car has a long way to go but on the other that there are plenty of positives that Bentley can build on in the future.
Problems on the track were not caused by mechanical issues, meaning that performance and reliability was proven. What actually caused trouble for the cars was impacts with debris up ahead as the race saw an unusually high number of accidents and also a high rate of attrition. Thanks to one incident, the race was halted at one point for an hour.
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