JLM Racing AJR starts Endurance Brasil season with win at Goiânia

The 2021 Império Endurance Brasil season kicked off at Goiânia immersed in new things, be them cars, drivers, teams, etc. Even though the competition got tougher compared to the already tough 2020, JLM Racing prevailed in a race looked like it had been put on a wheel of fortune, with the No. 175 JLM Racing AJR of Henrique Assunção, Fernando Ohashi and Fernando Fortes topping the chart with a late charge to the win.

Repeating the trend of previous years, the JLM Racing AJR fleet locked the front rows, with the No. 65 NC Racing AJR keeping the command inherited from the qualifying, while most of the other AJRs were following the leader in the top pack.

With ten minutes and 6 laps of racing there were already some cars stopping on track due to failures, and with too many hazards on track, the safest was to call the Safety Car. Along the stopped machines, the No. 20 Ebrahim Ginetta also went to the garage for checks as it crawled slowly on track for a whole lap. The No. 80 Power Imports AJR was another car knocked out, but this time it was due to accident damage, and fire in the brake halted the race of the returning No. 56 Motorcar MRX.

The No. 65 NC Racing AJR was in control of the race during the whole first hour, but once it pitted the problems started appearing, with a brake overheat compromising its run, which handed the first place to the No. 444 Motorcar AJR for a brief period, as it gained a drive through penalty for pitlane speeding, with the same going to the No. 113 JLM AJR and the No. 27 Team RC Mercedes, and with most of the leading cars tumbling down the order, the GT3s were closing down in the P1s despite the pace deficit, with the No. 83 Team RC Mercedes basically managing the GT3 class lead until it was stamped with a drive through too, offering the class lead to the No. 03 Racing M3 Mercedes.

The roulette of drive through penalties continued for around 20 minutes, and when things settled down, the No. 175 JLM AJR became the overall leader and the debuting No. 16 Blau McLaren took the GT3 class lead from second overall.

After a brief yellow flag period, the No. 175 JLM AJR had the return of the No. 444 Motorcar AJR to the lead battle after its penalty in the second hour, and Gustavo Kyrila was quick to move to first and go away with it, with other prototypes coming to the party and the No. 113 JLM AJR showing its strong pace by engaging into a fierce battle with the No. 444, with the resistance of the Motorcar Racing machine proving to be fruitful, but when the pace was set to open the gap, a puncture hindered the effort of the No. 444, leaving open way for the No. 113.

Just behind the top prototypes, the No. 16 Blau McLaren opted for a conservative end of race despite having the class, as lack of spare parts would affect not only this race but the subsequent ones, so the No. 55 Stuttgart Porsche and the No. 27 Team RC Mercedes took first and second in class, with the Porsche pushing to defend the position.

The big push from Ricardo Maurício propelled the No. 55 Stuttgart Porsche to second overall, but the German machine was locked between AJRs, even though they weren’t exactly on close quarters. The difference in pace between prototypes and GTs appeared in the final hour, with the Porsche being left behind in favor of an all-JLM Racing battle between the No. 113 and the No. 175, with a larger advantage to the charging No. 175, and Fernando Fortes needed to be quite forceful to go past Pedro Queirolo, and once the No. 175 was ahead, it was clear way to push and open the gap as most of the backmarkers were also left behind.

While the top two positions were practically locked, the No. 65 NC Racing AJR crowned its recovery drive from its brake overheat by overtaking the No. 55 Stuttgart Porsche for third place overall, to add to their third place in the P1 class, but as good as their recovery was, the No. 175 JLM Racing AJR was still on top with authority, with the No. 113 JLM Racing AJR consolidating the runner-up finish.

Endurance Brasil - 4H of Goiânia results

The No. 55 Stuttgart Porsche had a comfortable end of race to conquer the GT3 class win out of fifth overall, and contrary to the trend of multiple classes featuring in the overall top ten in 2020, the first race of 2021 had only P1s and GT3s into the ten best, with the next best placed class winner being the No. 18 Mottin MCR, winning the P2 class from 13th place.

The No. 15 AMG CAC Mercedes beat the No. 43 AutLog McLaren for GT4 class honors, while the No. 5 MC Tubarão MRX took the P3 class win despite doing a race with damage limitation for most of the time, while the GT4 Light class was conquered by the No. 69 Stillux Ginetta, which had the cleaner run of the lot.

The cars will go back to track at Curitiba, on 5 June with another four hour race.

PHOTO: Endurance Brasil/MS2