Royan: Difficult race at the GT World Challenge in Misano for the Espace Bienvenue team

Royan team Espace Bienvenue encountered difficulties during the sixth round of the GT World Challenge at Misano, despite good results in practice.

The sixth round (sprint cup) of the GT World Challenge 2025, organized by AWS, took place in Misano, Italy, during the weekend of July 17-20. Last year's winner on this circuit, leading the field during the opening tests of the GT4 European series, the Royan team Espace Bienvenue was hoping for better for this race on the Italian circuit but "the competition is always tight in GT4 and many teams took turns to reduce tiny margins on the best times, before Ricardo van der Ende, the Espace Bienvenue driver, put the #17 BMW in the lead during qualifying."

The races took place on Saturday and Sunday. Reached Sunday evening, André Grammatico, the team manager, was disappointed. His drivers did not disgrace themselves, but competition at this level is very demanding and the slightest mishap can have consequences. He reported: "This weekend, luck was not with us. We started in ^8th position for the first race. After the halfway point, we were ^3rd , but the race director asked us to give up the place because of a small contact! We complied and thus finished again just off the podium."

He continues: "For the second race, Benjamin Lessenes (the team's second driver) started in ^4th position, so on the second outside row. He had a splendid start and found himself ^2nd after half a lap, but on the third lap, he announced that he had a puncture on the right rear! This forced him to stop to change wheels, but for us the race was over! We lost a place in the general classification and went from ^5th to ^6th place."

André Grammatico concluded: "We can console ourselves by noting that in the general classification the gaps are tight between ^2nd and ^7th place. Our goal of being on the podium at the end of the year is still achievable and we will focus on the two remaining competition weekends on the program, on the Nürburgring circuit in Germany at the end of August and in Barcelona (Spain) at the beginning of October."