Manthey 1st Phorm takes title glory as Akkodis ASP Team holds on for a nail-biting victory in Bahrain…
The Akkodis ASP Lexus team secured its second win of the 2025 season at the Bapco Energies 8 Hours of Bahrain, but only after a tense finale in which the French-entered team’s victory appeared to be under serious threat in the final stages.
The #87 Akkodis ASP Lexus RC F GT3 of Jose Maria Lopez, Clemens Schmid and Razvan Umbrarescu just held off the #61 Iron Lynx Mercedes AMG LMGT3 of Maxime Martin, Lin Hodenius and Martin Berry by just 0.7s.
While the Akkodis ASP team added Bahrain to its maiden 6 Hours of Sao Paulo win in July, a fourth place confirmed the Manthey 1stPhorm squad of Richard Lietz, Ryan Hardwick and Riccardo Pera as both 2025 LMGT3 drivers and teams’ champions.
The title success ensured that the German team clinched back-to-back LMGT3 title victories, which saw solid foundations built via a pair of wins at Imola and Le Mans, in addition to five otgher points scoring performances.
But it was the # 87 Lexus that was in command for the majority of the race, with Lopez enjoying a lead of approximately 13 seconds before a final Safety Car closed up the field.
Pera had been running in second place before he handed over to now two time WEC champion Lietz for the final tense stint, as the Austrian driver was forced to relinquish positions to both the Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo of Mattia Drudi and Maxime Martin in the No. 61 Iron Lynx Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo, slightly after the 8 hour race went back to green flag running.
Drudi, who shares the No. 27 Aston Martin with Zacharie Robichon and Ian James, pushed through to launch a challenge on Lopez for the lead, but he was unable to make the move stick and was actually usurped by Martin.
Second place for the #61 witnessed the best finish of a challenging campaign for the Iron Lynx team.
That fourth position though was enough for the Manthey 1stPhorm trio of Lietz, Hardwick and Pera to clinch the championship with a 14 point buffer ahead of the #21 VISTA AF Corse Ferrari drivers Alessio Rovera, Simon Mann and Francois Heriau, who came home in fifth position.
As ever in LMGT3 the battles raged throughout the day in to nighttime encounter. One of the most entertaining was #33 TF Sport Corvette driver Daniel Juncadella’s with Augusto Farfus’ #31 The Bend WRT BMW.
The two traded several touches but it was the Spanish ace who won out as he took sixth position in the car he shares with Ben Keating and Jonny Edgar.
While Akkodis ASP celebrated on one hand, it commiserated on the other as the polesitting No. 78 car driven by Finn Gehrsitz, Ben Barnicoat and Arnold Robin was forced into the garage in the second hour with a technical problem.
But there was solace for the Jerome Policand fronted team as the win for the #87 promoted them in to third position in both the teams and drivers’ final standings.
Thomas Flohr emerged unscathed from a substantial accident in the #54 VISTA AF Corse Ferrari after he was clipped by the #38 Cadillac Hertz Team Jota Hypercar when Jenson Button, in his final professional event, misjudged an overtaking manoeuvre. The #38 car was penalised for the incident, which triggered the first of two safety cars in the season finale.
Click HERE for the race results.
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