Danish team Insight Racing had a long journey home from Belgium’s Spa-Francorchamps circuit after Total 24 Hours of Spa. The fourth round of Blancpain Endurance Series was held at the legendary circuit in the Ardennes forests as a twice around the clock race with more than 70 cars on track.
Insight Racing lined up with regular Danish drivers Martin Jensen and Dennis Andersen with the aid of a third driver for this occasion, Britain’s Iain Dockerill, a driver well known around the 7.3 km Grand Prix track.
Everything went according to plan during the first half of the race, although the team opted not to have pro-driver Martin Jensen take double stints. The white, blue and red Ferrari 458 Italia was among the 10 best placed cars in the pro-am category after 12 hours, until technical issues started to hamper the team’s progress.
Around noon on Sunday, with 3.5 hours racing to go, disaster struck for the team, when they were taken out of the race in a violent manner by a competitor. Iain Dockerill was behind the wheel and without fault in the accident that severely damaged Ferrari #17. Luckily, both drivers were ok.
Insight Racing was classified in 34th position.
Martin Jensen, driver and Team Manager: “That was a bitter end to the race and very difficult for Iain, of course. The car is very badly damaged; the entire front has been ripped off, so we probably have to write it off. Most importantly, Iain is ok physically. I feel sorry for him and for the boys in the team. All in all it was a tough race with very high temperatures and no real rain, which is extraordinary for Spa. Our strategy worked well and we picked up places all the way. After 12 hours of racing the car was running well and we were in the top ten with our goal in reach. Sunday morning the problems began to appear when the left rear suspension failed and we had to pit for repairs. Back on track, the right drive shaft failed and shortly after we had the crash. It’s a bitter pill to swallow. Everything went well, all pitstops went like a Swiss clockwork and both Dennis and Iain did a great race and kept the car out of trouble.”
Dennis Andersen, driver: “We arrived at the track well prepaired and with extra and very competent crew members. The Blancpain Endurance Series is a very strong championship as it is, and a lot of teams had more professional drivers to strengthen their lineups, so we had a close qualification, where we lacked a bit to be up there. We abandoned the plan about having Martin to double stint due to the heat and humidity, but once we all had been in the car we found a good rhythm and a good race pace. Before the issues and the crash everything looked good – we were P9 and chasing the car in front. Then we had the two technical issues, both on new parts, but we kept on fighting right until Iain through no fault of his own was hit by a competitor. We do take a lot of positives from the race, though, as we had the pace for a good result, we performed well during pitstops and driver changes and the atmosphere in the team was fantastic!”
Source : Insight Racing