The World Endurance Championship’s second race of the 2017 season took place on Belgium ground at the famous Spa-Francorchamps 7-km race track. Truly motivated by the great results of the team at Silverstone, TDS Racing was enthusiast for the coming event, and also remaining humble because it’s still a new team in the championship. François Perrodo, Emmanuel Collard and Ben Hanley, who had taken over Matthieu Vaxivière after his foot injury, completed the race finishing 7th of the LMP2. It was nevertheless a hard and demanding weekend, as much for the drivers as for the car.
The team got a little lucky in Silverstone, but it was not the case in Spa. As soon as in the first free practice session, the team was in trouble because of a faulty electrical beam which had to be change during the session. Ben Hanley was therefore the only driver able to take the wheel for a few laps, whereas François and Ben would have needed to drive much more. The set-up work was only possible in Free Practice 2 and 3.
British driver Ben Hanley and French François Perrodo were designated to qualify the car, while Emmanuel Collard was nominated to take the start.
Starting on 7th row, “Manu” Collard completed a faultless double stint, dealing in the best possible way, with the penalty given to the team earlier in the weekend. In fact an operation laser that had been used during private testing the week before the race, had not been taken out of the car., which resulted into a “drive through” penalty, to be done in the first ten lap of the race. Despite the penalty, Manu took the #28 ORECA 07 to the 3rd LMP2 position during his 37-lap double stint. Ben Hanley took over completing the next 38 laps, before he handed the car to François for an additional 33 Belgian rounds. Ben took then the #28 all the way to the chequered flag.
WHAT THEY SAID ABOUT THEIR RACE :
François Perrodo (Bronze driver- FRA)
“ We were out of luck this weekend, with many little issues that made us lose time. It was a hard weekend in fact, I must really admit, even if I had fun in my very first stint, were I was able to perform quite well at some point. After that, I misjudged a situation with a GT that cost me a spin… I guess it must be part of the process in learning prototype racing. As I was in my second stint, my back started to hurt badly, because I did not sit well in the car. In these conditions, the smallest distraction can be very costly… and that’s what happened when I went off the track. So we lost additional time and I am really sorry for my teammates and for the guys who had done a great job to make up for the other problems we had. Really, they did not deserve that. Still, we have to look at the bright side of this weekend, because we had very good performance in the car and we progressed since the last race. Now we really know that we have what it takes to do better next time. And this is good news. ”
Ben Hanley (Gold – UK)
“ I came into this team for a race on track that I really appreciate, but we had quite some problems all over the weekend which hindered us to compete as much as we would have liked too. Anyway, the team is really great and I feel good here. The race was not easy for us, and tyre ware was one of the big reason. In addition, we had many little problems such as the penalty or the telemetric antenna issue that made us lose a lot of time in the pits. My final stint was just absolutely great, I could give it all and make up some time with good laps, but it was too late to catch up and get a better result. It’s a pity because I spend a great time with the team, and I would have loved to share a podium with this crew. ”
Emmanuel Collard (Platinium – FRA)
“ I started well and had a quite good rhythm even after having done the penalty. But because it was actually quite warm at the beginning of the race, I also had to take care and manage the tyres as good as possible. I did a small mistake in the hairpin curb when I was defending my position in the fight with Bruno Senna, and he passed me just when I had taken the LMP2 lead… It’s a pity. My second stint was just great, the car felt wonderful, we had the pace and a good rhythm in the race… Was really nice. ”
Xavier Combet – Team Manager
“ Despite the results which we would have liked to be much better, this weekend is positive for the TDS Racing team. First of all the drivers had to get to know each other, and that worked out very well. Ben did a very good job for his very first race in the team, and concerning François, it has to be said that he progressed a lot in prototype racing, as we could see during qualifying. With Ben, they set the 7th LMP2 qualifying time, same place as with Matthieu in Silverstone, but this week-end instead of the second best lap time from Matthieu, Ben did the 4th best time… this shows how much François improved. It is very encouraging for the future, and it definitely shows how much work he has done in such a little time period to improve his prototype learning. Manu made great stints and François’s off-tracks have nothing to do with the driver himself. He performs very well, has acquired a good race rhythm and is bettering race after race. Now we know that we can do it, and we know what we need to do, in order to reach results close to the one we had at Silverstone. It’s just a matter of time. ”
