BARCELONA (4 September, 2021) – Herberth Motorsport currently holds the overall lead at the 2021 Hankook 24H BARCELONA amidst a sensational on-going battle with WTM powered by Phoenix.

The Herberth Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R (#91, Daniel Allemann / Ralf Bohn / Alfred Renauer / Robert Renauer), which started from pole position, held the advantage into turn one at the start of the race, and even began to pull away before the first of five Code 60 caution periods was called just 20 minutes into the event. Pitting for fuel, the two-time event winner dropped to 4th as the WTM powered by Phoenix Ferrari 488 GT3 (#22, Georg Weiss / Leonard Weiss / Jochen Krumbach / Daniel Keilwitz / Hendrik Still) moved into the lead, but a hard-charging Robert Renauer was soon on the Ferrari’s heels and back past during a storming opening stint for the German driver. 

Ironically, the ‘hunter’ and ‘hunted’ roles were reversed after the first driver changes when Daniel Keilwitz in the WTM Ferrari began to reign the Herberth Porsche back in, resuming the lead with a bold pass down the inside at turn three. A further Code 60, and a subsequent pit stop for WTM Racing, has since handed the lead of an unpredictable Hankook 24H BARCELONA back to Herberth Motorsport. 

Behind the top two, Car Collection Motorsport (#500, Nathanaël Berthon / Christer Joens / Martin Lechmann / Patric Niederhauser) is a very impressive 3rd overall on the competitive debut of the Audi R8 LMS EVO2. The second evolution of Audis’ flagship sports car, which also topped yesterday’s official Night Practice, has scythed its way through the field from 12th on the grid. The team’s Audi R8 LMS GT3 entry (#34, Johannes Dr. Kirchhoff / Gustav Edelhoff / Elmar Grimm / Max Edelhoff / Stefan Aust) currently rounds out the overall top 10.

The second Herberth Motorsport Porsche (#92, Jürgen Häring / Bobby Gonzales / Wolfgang Triller / Marco Seefried / Tim Müller), now 4th, is one of four cars to have led the event outright. Ironically, the fourth of these cars – the CP Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 (#85, Charles Putman / Charles Espenlaub / Joe Foster / Shane Lewis) – is now 5th, despite run-ins with Autorama Motorsport’s lead TCR entry and one of the Vortex V8 1.0s. 

The DINAMIC MOTORSPORT Porsche 991 GT3 R (#7, Roberto Pampanini / Mauro Calamia / Amedeo Pampanini / Nicolas Stürzinger) lies 6th ahead of the returning IDEC SPORT Mercedes-AMG GT3 (#17, Patrice Lafargue / Paul Lafargue / Paul-Loup Chatin / Nicolas Minassian). The Rutronik Racing by TECE Audi R8 LMS GT3 meanwhile (#18, Michael Doppelmayr / Pierre Kaffer / Elia Erhart / Swen Herberger) has worked its way back into the overall top 10 after the German team elected to cycle through three of its four drivers during the opening 40 minutes. 

MotoGP’s Miguel Oliveira has made a good start to his first-ever 24-hour car race as the True Racing KTM X-BOW GTX (#716, Miguel Oliveira / Reinhard Kofler / Ferdinand Stuck / Peter Kox) holds the GTX lead. Despite requiring a new gearbox to be transported from Zandvoort on Thursday night, the Red Camel-Jordans.nl Porsche 911 GT3 Cup (992) (#999, Ivo Breukers / Luc Breukers / Thierry Vermeulen / Bashar Mardini) is currently 2nd. 

The second of four KTMs competing here this weekend, True Racing’s sister entry (#717, Hubert Trunkenpolz / Peter Kox / Klaus Angerhofer / Sehdi Sarmini / Stefan Rosina) rounds out the top three thus far in GTX following an early puncture for Reiter Engineering (#724, Horst Felbermayr Jr. / Eike Angermayr / Mads Siljehaug) and clamshell issues for class polesitter, RTR Projects (#718, Tomáš Miniberger / Sergej Pavlovec / Erik Janiš / Petr Lisa / JM Littman).

Behind the GTX leaders, Willi Motorsport by Ebimotors (#955, Fabrizio Broggi / Sergiu Nicolae / Sabino de Castro) continues to lead RABDAN by MRS GTRacing (#989, Saif Alameri / Audrius Butkevicius / Nicola Michelon / Nikolai Gadetskii) in the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup-exclusive ‘991’ class, the former having held the advantage from the get-go. Despite pulling off-track shortly before the fourth hour with a suspected dry fuel tank, Overall GT Teams’ championship leader DUWO Racing (#909, Andrey Mukovoz / Stanislav Sidoruk / Sergey Peregudov) is still 3rd in-class after nearest rival Speed Lover (#978, Olivier Dons / Gavin Pickering / Ricky Coomber) lost over an hour in the garage to brake failure.  

The ST Racing BMW M4 GT4 (#438, Samantha Tan / Chandler Hull / Jon Miller / Nick Wittmer) leads a very close battle for GT4 honours ahead of fellow North American entrant, RHC Jorgensen-Strom by Century (#450, Daren Jorgensen / Brett Strom / Danny van Dongen / Nathan Freke). Though its most recent pit stop has dropped the Audi R8 LMS GT4 further down the road, Car Collection Motorsport (#499, Lisa Clark / Mark Issa / Jeff Westphal / Martin Lechmann) remains well in contention for the category win on the team’s first GT4 run of 2021. 

Despite a brush from the CP Racing Mercedes sending the Volkswagen Golf GTI into the gravel during the opening stages, Autorama Motorsport (#1, Emil Heyerdahl / Jasmin Preisig / Constantin Kletzer / Roberto Ferri) has worked its way back to the front in the TCE division ahead of its sister entry (#112, Arunas Geciauskas / Sigitas Ambrazevicius / Vytenis Gulbinas / Paul Sieljes). The Swiss team currently leads the Overall TCE Teams’ standings, just one point clear of the CWS Engineering Ginetta G55 (#278, Colin White / Ian Stinton / Jean- François Brunot / Angus Fender). The latter, which started from TCE pole position, currently holds 3rd despite making an additional pit stop to remove excess tyre pick-up. 

Spanish teams RAIL EQUIP BY TOTCAR SPORT (#123, Jorge Belloc Diaz / Jorge Belloc Ruiz / Álvaro Rodríguez Sastre) and Baporo Motorsport (#151, Manel Lao Gorina / Manel Lao Cornago / Llorenç Fluxà Domene / Llorenç Fluxà Cross), both of which are running CUPRA TCRs this weekend, are currently 4th and 5th respectively in the TCE division ahead of the Team ACP - Tangerine Associates BMW M2 CS Racing (#221, Wim Spinoy / Catesby Jones / Jim Norman). An early puncture for Bas Koeten Racing (#125, Bert Mets / Jos Stevens / Bob Stevens / Martin van den Berge / Christiaan Frankenhout) has since dropped the Dutch-entered CUPRA back to 7th. 

Overall TCE Teams’ title contender AC Motorsport (#188, Stéphane Perrin / Mathieu Detry / James Kaye / Vincent Radermecker) is still circulating at the tail of the division, a 20-minute pit stop at the very start of the race having hindered the Audi RS 3 LMS’ run. 

The Hankook 24H BARCELONA will continue uninterrupted throughout the night at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, with the chequered flag set to be waved at 12.00 hrs local time on Sunday 6 September. The action will be live with commentary from radiolemans.com on the official 24H SERIES YouTube channel. Regular updates will also be published on Twitter (@24HSeries), Facebook (24H Series) and Instagram (24H Series). Further information can be found Further information can be found HERE