GT Racing is back in Europe for 2025, with 59 cars spread across 10 manufacturers it really is anyone’s race to win! So gear up for six hours of epic action as the SRO’s flagship series gets underway.

There was drama even before the formation lap, with the #5 Mclaren and #80 Lionspeed Porsche starting from the pits following mechanical woes prior to the start. Lionspeed specifically had a fire erupt in their garage, necessitating their pitlane start.

It was an all Mercedes front row with Joules Gounon alongside Maro Engel leading the field away to the opening corner, the latter taking the initiative and set about establishing an early lead. Mirko Bortolotti made his way up to second in the #63 Grasser Racing Lamborghini as the field made it through without incident. 

Just three laps in, the Comtoyou Aston Martin had its bonnet flip up, Nicolas Baert bringin the car competing in the Silver Cup into the pits.

And then, the hard charging Marvin Kirchoffer found his Mclaren stuck between gears, touring slowly into the pits and losing significant time and down to virtually last in the Pro class before long.

The lead battle settled down around half an hour in, with Maro Engel in the #48 Man Filter Racing Mercedes, ahead of Mirko Bortolotti in the aforementioned GRT Lamborghini and Dean Macdonald in the Gold Cup leading #58 Mclaren of Garage 59. Ayhancan Guven meanwhile struggled, creating a train longer than some of Jarno Trulli’s own behind him as he fought to maintain fifth.

And though Marvin Kirchoffer would get going again, the Mclaren was already done and would pull over along the Mistral, bringing out the first FCY of the race.

Another Mclaren would then go, this time one of the four Gold Cup contesting cars of Optimum Motorsport. It was the #9 entry with James Allen pulling over and stopping on track, bringing out another FCY.

The pit stops then came in dozens, with everyone seeking to gain the free time advantage on offer with ten minutes until the first hour was up. 

With them done, it was Dean Macdonald in the #58 Mclaren to close out his stint by hounding Maro Engel’s #48 Mercedes as the two diced for the lead to bookend the hour. 

Those two lost time in the pitstops though, with Macdonald passing Engel and the Porsches of Ayhancan Guven (Schumacher CLRT’s #22) and Sven Muller (Rutronik’s #96) assumed a one-two lead for a while until the rapid Dean Macdonald took it for the Garage 59 crew, opening up a slim gap.

And so far that’s how its stayed as we enter the second third of the race, as usual in these longer races its settled down nicely, but anything can still blow this one wide open!

thumbnail credit – Presse CPR, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons