Two down, one more to go! The third race in June’s trilogy of 24 hour battles commences, and with no less than 76 cars across five classes vying for glory, it’s sure to be an epic. But just who will come out on top in the most prestigious GT race in the world? It’s time to close the 72 Hours of June with a scorcher.

Early news into the seventh hour was the disappointing announcement after one of the strongest cars in qualifying, the Boutsen VDS #9 of Maxime Martin was withdrawn from the race after the damage sustained from the earlier incident at Blanchimont proved worse than initially thought. The day wasn’t entirely over for the team itself, as the #10 Mercedes was still having a good run in the Silver Cup, running 4th in its class with Cesar Gazeau at the wheel. The first full course yellow during the night running was called out when the #12 Rinaldi Racing Ferrari slid off into the gravel under the control of Davide Rigon. Sitting 52nd overall they had been jostling in a pack of Bronze Cup class cars, and sitting 13th in class, and though the extent of any damage was unknown at time of writing, they were perhaps lucky to escape unscathed.

In the next pit stop window the #48 took a contrarian approach, effectively taking a splash and dash stop whereas almost everyone else took a full tank of fuel, thus allowing Maro Engel’s Mann-Filter Mercedes to not only take the lead of the race, but give Mercedes a provisional 1-2 as Joules Gounon sat second in the #17 GetSpeed Mercedes. Sandy Mitchell was back in the #163 VSR Lamborghini in third place, with fourth being held by Antonio Fuoco and the former race leader #59 Garage 59 McLaren sitting fifth now, Marvin Kirchofer at the wheel.

While running fifth in the Gold Cup class and battling for the the podium, the #57 Winward Racing Mercedes of Indy Dontje was spun at la source by Reece Barr’s #23 RJN Motorsport McLaren as Maro Engel pitted from the lead after taking a short pit stop and altering their strategy.

One ongoing recovery story if that of the #51, who lost a lap in the early stages of the race after suffering brake issues but now were not only back on the lead lap but found themselves in 14th position overall and challenging the leading BMW’s with a view to climbing further up the order. The opposite side of the Francorchamps Motors branded garage was enjoying a much more successful outing, running third overall with Antonio Fuoco at the wheel and just 1.5 seconds off the leader before taking its next pit stop.

Hailing from Japan the Goodsmile Racing team had joined the Pro field for this race, running the #00 Mercedes with Tatsuya Kataoka, Nobuteru Taniguchi and most notably Kamui Kobayashi sharing driving duties. It had probably struggled the most of the entire Pro field, and now would be forced into the pits.

After an earlier puncture, the #911 Pure X Racing Porsche announced its official retirement from the race.

And after its earlier spin, the #57 Mercedes of Winward Racing went off into the gravel on the exit of Les Combes and spun across the racetrack, the extent of the damage unclear but a good sign was that Russel Ward, who was at the controls, did not pit immediately and stayed out on track.

By now, with it approaching midnight here in the UK and 1am in Belgium, Marco Mapelli held a slender lead in the #163 VSR Lamborghini over the #17 GetSpeed Mercedes of Luca Stolz with 20 year old Eliseo Donno on his tail in the #50 Ferrari. Fourth was Benji Goethe ahead of Mattia Drudi in the 2024 race winning #7 Aston Martin with Maro Engel sitting sixth in the #48 Mann-Filter Racing Mercedes. Jordan Pepper ran in eighth position in the #63 GRT Lamborghini. Meanwhile the Verstappen.com #33 Aston Martin had been leading the Gold Cup class since the start and still held a good advantage over the second and third placed McLarens of Aurthur Rougier’s CSA Racing #111 and the #58 Garage 59 of Louis Prette. Silver Cup was now led by the #99 Tresor Attempto Racing Audi of Phillipe Denes, while Bronze was in the hands of Lionspeed GP’s #80 of Ricardo Feller. And finally, Pro/Am was still led by the #29 Porsche of AV by Car Collection Motorsports.

To close out the hour, the #23 Team RJN McLaren ran wide at Les Combes and over the gravel, forced to take the long escape road, dropping it down in the Gold Cup class in which it was already struggling, running down in third.

So as we continue to move through the night there’s still plenty of contenders left in this race, but as we’ve seen before Spa in no stranger to drama of the highest order. So who will be left as the sun rises once more over Eau Rouge?

Thumbnail credit – Cabose via discord