Algarve Blancpain: Bleekemolen/Proczyk's Grasser Lamborghini wins
Jeroen Bleekemolen and Hari Proczyk will start the fifth round of the Blancpain Sprint Series on pole position, having won the qualifying race at Algarve
The Lamborghini lockout on the front row was reversed by the time the cars reached the first corner, as Grasser driver Bleekemolen moved past polesitter Tomas Enge's G-Drive-branded Reiter car when the lights went out.
On a clumsy opening lap, Giorgio Pantano's Bhaitech McLaren spun the Phoenix Audi of Alessandro Latif, while the two ROAL BMWs collided, as Stefano Colombo hit Alex Zanardi at Turn 8.
Ultimately it was Colombo who came off worse, beached in the gravel, and a safety car was required to remove the stricken Z4.
Enge was struggling in second place, and eventually lost control at the challenging final corner, dropping him back to fifth place just before the pitstop window opened.
The championship leading HTP Mercedes of Max Buhk and Max Gotz opted to make an early pitstop, and while others battled they capitalised on a clear track to emerge in second position once the window closed.
It was then a straight fight between Proczyk in the leading Lamborghini and the charging Gotz in the Mercedes.
Gotz made one attempt into the Turn 5 hairpin, but Proczyk held his nerve and took victory, reducing the gap at the top of the championship to 16 points.
Completing the podium was Enzo Ide and Rene Rast, after a quiet second stint saw them finish four seconds adrift of the race leader, with their WRT team-mates Laurens Vanthoor and Cesar Ramos a further 10s behind them.
The second HTP Mercedes of Sergei Afanasiev and Stef Dusseldorp finished fifth.
The pole car of Enge and Roman Rusinov eventually finished in sixth place, ahead of the top two cars in the Silver Cup, the WRT Audi of Mateusz Lisowski and Vincent Abril and HTP's Wolf and Stolz.
The two BMW Team Brazil cars completed the top 10, with Caca Bueno and Sergio Jimenez edging out their team-mates Nelson Piquet and Matheus Stumpf by just half a second at the flag.
Results - 32 laps: Pos Drivers Team/Car Time/Gap 1. Proczyk/Bleekemolen Grasser Lamborghini 2. Gotz/Buhk HTP Mercedes 0.819s 3. Ide/Rast WRT Audi 4.061s 4. Ramos/Vanthoor WRT Audi 10.658s 5. Afanasiev/Dusseldorp HTP Mercedes 12.626s 6. Rusinov/Enge G-Drive Lamborghini 16.422s 7. Abril/Lisowski WRT Audi 23.966s 8. Wolf/Stolz HTP Mercedes 25.688s 9. Bueno/Jimenez Team Brasil BMW 29.904s 10. Stumpf/Piquet Jr AutOrlando BMW 30.419s 11. Basseng/Latif Phoenix Audi 31.190s 12. Pentus/van der Drift Bhaitech McLaren 31.987s 13. Jager/Baumann Schubert BMW 37.104s 14. Zanardi ROAL BMW 40.421s 15. Ebrahim/Toril Fortec McLaren 44.368s 16. Halek/Landmann Grasser Lamborghini 1m08.757s 17. Hamprecht/Ortelli WRT Audi -1 lap 18. Coimbra/Silva Sports Mercedes -1 lap Retirements: Mayr-Melnhof/Winkelhock Phoenix Audi 7 laps Onidi/Pantano Bhaitech McLaren 2 laps Mora/Pinheiro Sports Mercedes 2 laps Fumanelli/Colombo ROAL BMW 1 lap
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