Entertaining opening to ELMS season but Zolder cancellation leaves future uncertain

The new European Le Mans Series campaign kicked off at Paul Ricard on Sunday, but fears that the championship will not see the end of the season quickly emerged as round two at Zolder was cancelled.

Sunday's six-hour race provided an entertaining start to 2012. The TDS Racing pairing of Mathias Beche and Pierre Thiriet scored victory in the event, coming home a lap ahead of the Sebastien Loeb Racing entry of Nicolas Minassain, Nicolas Marroc and Stephane Sarrazin. The pursuing French trio remained under the radar for most of the run but, despite never possessing winning pace, claimed a runner-up finish that provides rally legend Loeb's team with a great start to the season.

The podium was completed by Status GP, whose line-up of single-seater converts Yelmer Buurman and Alexander Sims and SPEED EuroSeries graduate Dean Stirling was rapid at times but ultimately could not bring the challenge to the TDS car.



In fact it was the Greaves entry of Alex Brundle, Tom Kimber-Smith and Lucas Ordonez who looked most likely to fight the French squad for the win, but damage to their Zytek-Nissan and an extended stop-go penalty left them unable to better fourth.

The JMW Motorsport Ferrari of James Walker and Jonny Cocker scored a thrilling late victory in GTE-Pro, leapfrogging the JMB car of Jamie Melo and Marco Frezza after the Monegasque squad were forced to make a late fuel stop GTE-Am class honours went to Marc Goossens and Maxime Soulet (ProSpeed Porsche).

However the promising opening round was soured by news that the championship's second round at Zolder (may 20) had been canned due to a lack of entries.

21 cars took part in Sunday's race and just 19 entries were registered for the Belgian event. The series had targeted a minimum of 25 cars and will look to bolster its ranks ahead of the trip to Donington in July.

"This decision, the outcome of a long discussion, was taken because the number of entrants (19) for the Belgian round was judged to be insufficient to ensure that the race unfolded in the best possible manner to ensure media fallout worthy of a six-hour event," ELMS promoter Patrick Peter revealed in a statement issued yesterday.

Peter added that the series will look to pick up more GT entries for the British event, with the current LMP2 field of 11 representing a solid prototype quota.

"To achieve this objective, discussions have begun between the different partners to find solutions to attract more entrants for the various categories, in particular GTE, FLM and GTC.

"For the latter widening the range of eligible cars is being studied, and will be confirmed as soon as possible according to the results of the technical assessment carried out by the ACO."

The next scheduled ELMS round at Donington is set to run July 15, though a number of teams will contest the Le Mans 24 Hours before the British event. 

Watch LIVE European Le Mans Series action on Motors TV


James Weeks