Andrea Piccini, a winner of the race as a driver with the Phoenix Audi squad in 2012, described Pier Guidi’s drive over the final half hour to haul the Iron Lynx Ferrari 488 GT3 Evo he shared with Nicklas Nielsen and Come Ledogar back into the lead as “unbelievable”.
“We all know we had a superb automotive within the rain, however Ale [Alessandro] gave it that little bit further,” Piccini instructed Autosport.
“What he did will imply it will go down within the historical past of Spa 24 Hours as one of many particular ones, it was historical past making.
“The extent of danger he took within the final minutes with out making a mistake to make the win attainable was unbelievable.
“Ale made the distinction in the present day.”
Pier Guidi needed to come from behind within the automotive that led the vast majority of the race after the chasing WRT Audi crew gambled on giving Dries Vanthoor wet-weather tyres on the automotive’s last pitstop with simply over 50 minutes to go.
A sudden downpour whereas the Belgian was on his out-lap within the R8 LMS GT3 wherein he partnered Kelvin van der Linde and Charles Weerts turned a deficit of 20s right into a lead of almost a minute after the Ferrari stopped two laps later.
Piccini, who additionally completed an in depth second at Spa in 2006 in one other dramatic wet-weather end, admitted that he believed that Iron Lynx has misplaced the prospect of victory on its Spa 24 Hours debut.
“If I’m sincere, there was a second after I thought it was over, our probability was gone,” he mentioned.
He paid testomony to Pier Guidi and the engineer of the #51 Ferrari run at the side of AF Corse, Luca Volta, for not giving up.
“I’ve to be sincere that for a second or two I believed it was over for us,” defined Piccini. “However Luca [Volta] our engineer and Ale by no means hand over.
“[Volta] was saying, ‘Come on guys we will nonetheless do it; there’s going to be a yellow’.”
#51 Iron Lynx Ferrari 488 GT3: Alessandro Pier Guidi, Nicklas Nielsen, Côme Ledogar
Photograph by: SRO
A Full Course Yellow that grew to become a full security automotive earlier than the restart closed the hole between Vanthoor and Pier Guidi to only underneath 4 seconds when the race went inexperienced.
The manufacturing unit Ferrari driver was capable of shut down the chief after which made a profitable transfer for the lead across the exterior of the quick Blanchimont right-hander (see video under).
Pier Guidi mentioned: “We led the race more often than not, however in that half an hour every part seemed misplaced.
“After the restart, I gave every part — I had no selection.”
He described the victory as an “unimaginable feeling” however mentioned that it might “take a little bit of time to sink in”.
Iron Lynx’s Spa 24 Hours debut bought off to a foul begin when Davide Rigon in the sister car was involved in a multi-car shunt at Eau Rouge in the opening hour.
He was briefly hospitalised, whereas Williams Components 1 reserve driver Jack Aitken, who was racing an Emil Frey Lamborghini Huracan GT3 Evo, sustained fractures to his collarbone and a vertebra within the incident.