20
October
2018
|
23:00 PM
Europe/Amsterdam

2018 European Le Mans Series all-Dunlop GTE title to be decided in Portugal

  • 5 teams in contention for class honours
With the European Le Mans Series (ELMS) title decided at the last round, attention now turns to the all-Dunlop LMGTE class battle at the Portimāo season finale this weekend.
 
Five teams are still in contention for the honour and there are four hours of racing on track for the teams to fight it out.
 
Proton Competition’s #88 squad currently leads, the #88 Porsche 911 RSR being the only car to have led at some point in every race this season. The team is the only squad to score points at all five rounds, but has only had one win– the Red Bull Ring saw them dominate and win by over a full lap. Two pole positions have added two valuable points to the score.
 
JMW Motorsport, defending champions, has taken two of the five wins of the season despite only having led 22 laps all year in the #66 Ferrari F488 GTE. With the added point for pole position in Austria, JMW is currently 11.5 points behind #88 Proton Competition with a maximum of 26 points available for the weekend.
Just one point further behind is the #55 Spirit of Race Ferrari. The dominant winner of the 4 Hours of Monza has had podium finishes at every round except at the Le Castellet season-opener where the team failed to score points. Ebi Motors and the #77 Proton Competition Porsches both also have mathematical chances of winning the title.
 
2017 saw the first Portimāo ELMS race since 2010, and Dunlop allocated the medium and medium-plus options in anticipation of the resurfacing, long high-downforce corners and elevation changes that characterise the track. For 2018, Dunlop’s new tyre range has been designed to provide wider operating windows and this year, with data from 2017 and a new range, the Dunlop engineers have selected the A and B (soft and medium stiffness) for the event. Intermediate and full-wet tyres are available if required.
 
The 4 Hours of Portimāo, the final round of the ELMS, takes place on 28th October
 
Mike McGregor, Dunlop Manager Testing & Track Support
 “This is going to be another great championship show-down. Year after year we have great battles in GTE for the title and it looks to be that way again. This year the majority of teams have opted to use the soft option so it will be interesting to see what they choose for Portimāo.  It is a great track to decide the title and we should have four hours of great racing. It would be a very brave person that would be confident of predicting the winner.”