Spa-Francorchamps has hosted the Belgian round of the Michelin Le Mans Cup since the first season in 2016, when the series was for GT3 cars only.
Here are some facts and figures from the nine previous races held at Spa-Francorchamps.
- The first race winners in the Michelin Le Mans Cup were Aleksey Basov and Victor Shaitar in the no72 SMP Racing Ferrari 488. They finished just 0.722 seconds ahead of the no88 Mentos Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R of Egidio Perfetti and Klaus Bachler.
- The first LMP3 MLMC race winners were Alex Toril and Jean Glorieux in the no3 DKR Engineering Norma M30-Nissan. The victory secured the 2017 LMP3 titles for the drivers and the team.
- Giacomo Piccini has won the most races at Spa, winning in 2018 and 2019 with Sergio Pianezzola in the no8 Kessel Racing Ferrari and in 2020 with Rino Mastronardi in the no8 Iron Lynx Ferrari.
- Kessel Racing took a 1-2-3 finish in GT3 in 2018, with GMB Motorsport also taking all three GT3 podium places in 2022.
- 2021 MLMC LMP3 Champions Colin Noble and Tony Wells have both been on the podium three times.Noble and Wells finished 2nd in 2017 and 3rd in 2020, while Noble won in 2018 alongside Alasdair McCaig in the no79 Ecurie Ecosse / Nielsen Ligier.Tony Wells finished second alongside James Littlejohn in the same race giving the British team a 1-2.
- In 2023 Stellar Motorsport took their debut MLMC GT3 win in Belgium with Mark Cole and Sennan Fielding, which was also the first time an Audi R8 has won a MLMC race.
- In 2024 Bretton Racing took their debut MLMC victory, the first for a Czech team, with AF Corse securing a 1-2 finish in GT3.
- Ferrari has won six of the nine GT3 encounters at Spa-Francorchamps, with Mercedes winning in 2017, Honda in 2022 and Audi in 2023.
- In 2023 the GT3 class saw six different manufacturers finish in the top six places – Audi, Lamborghini, Porsche, Honda, Aston Martin and Ferrari.
- Belgian teams and drivers have visited the podium at Spa three times since 2016 with Jean Glorieux taking victory in 2017 and finishing second in 2020. Eric De Doncker finished third in 2017 for Belgian team Motorsport98.
- In 2024 Max Van Der Snel and Max Ven Der Snel Jr became the first father and son duo to secure an MLMC LMP3 podium finish at Spa-Francorchamps when the crossed the line in third in no99 More Motorsport Ligier.
- The current MLMC LMP3 race lap record was set on 23 September 2023
LMP3 - Wayne BOYD - 2m13.407 - 189.0kph
- The current MLMC GT3 race lap record was also set on 23 September 2023
GT3 - Patrick KUJALA - 2m18.242 - 182.4kph
- The fastest outright lap recorded in LMP3 in the MLMC was set by Hadrien David in the no85 R-ace GP Duqueine with a 2m11.615 lap (191.6 kph) set during FP1 on the 23 August 2024.
- The fastest outright lap recorded in GT3 in the MLMC was by Fran Rueda Mateos in the no74 Kessel Racing Ferrari with a 2m17.173 lap (183.8 kph) set during FP2 on 23 August 2024.
- The longest race distance was 51 laps (357.2km) in 2017 (Jean Glorieux/ Alex Toril) and in 2020 (Nicolas Maulini / Edouard Cauhaupe). In 2022 the race time was shortened by 10 minutes, from 120-minutes to 110-minutes with the winners completing 36 laps.In 2023 the race distance was 32 laps and in 2024 it was 39 laps. The 2025 edition of the race in Belgium will return to 120-minutes.
- In the eight LMP3 races held since 2017, COOL Racing are the only team to take two wins (2020 and 2021) with the Swiss team narrowly missing out taking a third when Adrien Closmenil and James Sweetnam finished second just 0.570s behind Ben Stone and Theodor Jensen in the winning no62 Bretton Racing Ligier.
- The other winning LMP3 teams are Bretton Racing (2024), United Autosports (2023), Graff (2022), Lanan Racing (2019), Ecurie Ecosse / Nielsen (2018) and DKR Engineering (2017).
- In the nine GT3 races Iron Lynx and Kessel Racing have scored two wins each - 2021, 2020 for Iron Lynx and 2019 and 2018 for Kessel Racing. The other GT3 race winners are AF Corse (2024), Stellar Motorsport (2023), GMB Motorsport (2022), Lee Mowle (2017) and SMP Racing (2016).
The 120-minute race at Spa-Francorchamps is Round 4, and the fifth race, of the 2025 Michelin Le Mans Cup and it will be held on Saturday 23 August.
CLICK HERE for the championship standings after Round 3, Road To Le Mans.