Centenary edition
A frenetic month of 24-hour racing was concluded in style with the Crowdstrike 24 Hours of Spa. After eventful races at the Nürburgring and Le Mans, the centenary edition of the twice-round-the-clock race in the Belgian Ardennes. Organised by Stephan Ratel's SRO team, the 24 Hours of Spa is the headliner of the GT World Challenge Europe championship. The event starts early in the week with tests and then gets going in earnest on Wednesday evening with the traditional parade from the Circuit de Spa Francorchamps to a packed downtown Spa. The roads were lined with people, all looking to get a very close look of the competitors in the main race and the support events. These included races for the European GT4 and GT2 championships, the one-make McLaren Trophy and two historic grids that helped celebrate the centenary of the 24 Hours of Spa.
Our photographers were at the Circuit de Spa Francorchamps and many highlights of the weekend have been captured in this 140-shot gallery.

Support events
The support program represented several levels of international sports car racing, starting with the McLaren Trophy. Mildly modified versions of 570S and Artura went head-to-head with the ultimate goal being a proper test in the very wild McLaren Solus.
Similar specification cars also competed in two rounds of the GT4 European Series. A colourful mix of cars that included Alpine A110s, Lotus Emiras, Ford Mustangs but also Audi R8s and Mercedes-AMG GTs raced twice for an hour. Scoring victory in the first was the Elite Motorsport McLaren Artura GT4 of Brits Joshua Rattican and Thomas Lebbon. They also took victory in the second, this time beating the L'Espace Bienvenue BMW M4 GT4 with local racer Benjamin Lessennes and Dutchman Ricardo van der Ende at the helm.
A relatively recent addition to the SRO grids is the GT2 European Series aimed at gentleman drivers. The cars competing are subtly modified sports cars and included the Maserati MC20 and KTM XBow. Two 50-minute races were staged for the two-driver squads. In race one, victory fittingly went to the #1 Maserati of Leonardo Gorini and Carlo Tamburini. They finished a delayed 10th in the second race, which was won by KTM shared by Austrians Martin Koch and Reinhard Kofler.

Rich history
Especially for the centenary edition of the 24 Hours of Spa, two grids that normally compete in the Peter Auto championship were invited; the Heritage Touring Cup and the Endurance Racing Legends. These reflect the various incarnations of the event, which was run for touring cars for many years before switching back to GT machinery in 2001.
For the occasion, the cut-off date for the Heritage Touring Cup was stretched from 1986 to 2000. This opened the door for Group A cars like the BMW M3 and Ford Sierra RS Cosworth and also the subsequent Super Touring machinery, which included further M3s but also a diesel-engined Volkswagen Golf III. At the sharp-end of the field, there were no changes as the race was dominated by the beautifully prepared BMW 3.0 CSL shared by Michael Kammermann and Sebastian Glaser.
The Endurance Racing Legends field was appropriately restricted to GT cars with GT3 cars also allowed for this one. Olivier Galant reigned supreme in the two qualifying sessions with his Panoz Esperante GTR-1. Also lining up on the front row was the Maserati MC12 of Alex Rittweger and Sam Hancock. Interestingly it was still prepared by Michael Bartel's Vitaphone Racing team, which also fielded this car in period. Despite a gearshift issue in the last lap, Galant still managed to win the first of two races in the Panoz. Sadly, the Panoz gearbox failed altogether on lap one of race two. Victory instead went to Nico Verdonck in the #124 Lamborghini Murciélago.

24 Hours
Scheduled to start at 16:30 on Saturday afternoon, the centenary edition of the Spa 24 Hours attracted a bumper grid of 66 GT3-specification cars. The grid featured several classes determined by the ratings of the entered drivers. The grid for the race was set in several stages with all drivers having a go for 15 minutes each in the first qualifying session on Thursday. The average of the three or four times determined the bottom half of the grid with the top 20 going through to the super pole session on Friday. Franck Perera would go on to tope an exciting session on the Grasser Racing Lamborghini Huracan.
With the grid a true representation of the pace, the opening hour of the race was not particularly exciting as the blue Huracan held on to the lead. Several subsequent incidents brought out the safety car a few times and the field was re-shuffled. After what had been a beautiful weekend, the adverse weather Spa is famous for arrived over night. Due to the adverse conditions, there was another lengthy safety car period. Racing resumed at sunrise. After 23-hours, the race was headed by the #51 AF Corse Ferrari, which held a relatively comfortable 10-second lead. Sadly it all fell apart for the 296 GT3 when the pitlane entry was blocked by a stricken Lamborghini. The Ferrari's loss was the #007 Cometoyou Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo's gain. It was the first victory for Aston Martinin the 24 Hours of Spa since 1948. The unlucky Ferrari did fight back to claim what was still a very painful second.

Final thoughts
Close to 100,000 spectators flocked to the Belgian Ardennes to enjoy what was effectively five days of racing action. From the parade on Wednesday through to the surprise ending with historic perspective added by the two Peter Auto grids, it was a more than fitting centenary edition of the 24 Hours of Spa. Many of the weekend's highlights can be found in our 140-shot gallery.