PREMA claims third 2022 ELMS win at Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya
PREMA delivered a dominant win today in the fourth round of the 2022 European Le Mans Series season, the 4 Hours of Barcelona. The Italian squad secured its third win in four events, with drivers Lorenzo Colombo, Louis Delétraz and Ferdinand Habsburg providing a brilliant overall display of strategy, efficiency and consistency with the #9 Oreca LMP2 car.
Starting from P7 after a challenging qualifying session, the 25-year-old Austrian put up a massive early recovery up to P2 and then stormed to the lead after the first pit-stop. Over the second part of his driving segment, Habsburg stretched his advantage and handed the car to Lorenzo Colombo with a comfortable margin. The 21-year-old Italian picked up from where his colleague left off and further extended the gap.
In the following stages, he was called to manage fuel consumption, and also found himself in the middle of a complicated traffic situation with some lapped LMP2 competitors. However, he got away and rebuilt the advantage, leaving a spectacular impression once again.
Delétraz got in the car for the final part of the race, and his drive was no short of perfection while the team, as in the opening stages, made good use of the Full Course Yellow situations to get pit-stops out of the way. The 25-year-old Swissman saled away in the lead and eventually crossed the finish line in P1 for the delight of the whole team, which performed without a hitch and now regained a hefty margin in the series classification.
#9 LORENZO COLOMBO
“Before the start I told Ferdinand that if he could give me the car in P1 that would have been much appreciated and he actually did it! I had no troubles in the first part of my stint, managing the situation, tyres and fuel, to keep the lead and extend it a bit. In the second part we got a bit blocked in a pack with other LMP2s that were lapped. In Endurance racing we cannot expect them to move away like in single seaters, so I struggled a bit there as it’s not easy to overtake. Once we kept P1 safe I think we managed absolutely perfectly in the end. Today we did our best job, we could not do any better.”
#9 LOUIS DELETRAZ
“Very nice victory today, great to be back on top after the summer break. It was a very strong race, no mistakes and good pace. Ferdi had an amazing start, Lorenzo continued to keep the car in the lead, and I cruised to the end, making sure I had good tyres in case of a safety car. In the end nothing bad happened, we were quick and we won! Very happy, thank you to the team, I’m looking forward to the next one.”
#9 FERDINAND HABSBURG
“I was very appreciative that the team trusted me to take the car from the start because it’s an important risky part of the race, you want to be safe but also move forward. I had a great time and made a good start. I went up to fifth then overtook and got up to second. Then the safety car came out. We had to do some tyre management, nothing to be worried about, and I got into the lead. We had the quickest car and driver line-up. We were fast in every part of the race, zero penalties, and that’s how we end up winning in endurance racing. The start of the season has been rocky with wins, but also errors along the way, but now we improved a lot and have three wins, it’s crazy. We just need two more good races and have a good final part of the championship.”
Source | Photo: PREMA Racing