No.66 Tresor Attempto Racing Audi wins in GTWC EU Monza thriller

Credit: SRO/JEP

The No.66 Tresor Attempto Racing Audi achieved a surprise win in Monza's GT World Challenge Europe (GTWC EU) second Endurance Cup race, after an eventful three hours that finished under safety car conditions.

The 2026 GTWC EU Endurance Cup's second round in Monza, turned out to be highly unpredictable and incident riddled, with many favourites not even making it out of the first corner, as a Silver class car occupied the top spot come the end, that being the No.66 Tresor Attempto Racing Audi of Rocco Mazzola, Ariel Levi and Sebastian Øgaard winning outright, despite starting all the way down in 29th.

As it happened

At the start there was slight contact between the No.17 Team GetSpeed Mercedes of Maxime Martin and the No.51 AF Corse Ferrari of Alessio Rovera whilst attempting to get past the Ferrari, with Rovera spinning out of control, hitting the No.10 Boutsen VDS Porsche of Gilles Magnus and then triggering a multi-car pile-up in the first corner, that took out the race leaders!

In total six cars were out on the spot, amongst them both the HRT Ford Racing cars of overall poleman Arjun Maini and Silver class poleman Finn Wiebelhaus, the aforementioned No.10 and No.51 cars, as well as the No.59 Garage 59 McLaren of Marvin Kirchofer and the No.80 Lionspeed GP Porsche of Ricardo Feller.

A further two retired after limping back to the pits, them being the No.4 Optimum Motorsport McLaren and the No.7 Comtoyou Racing Aston Martin.

Martin who was under investigation by the stewards inherited the lead, from the now second place No.48 Mann-Filter Mercedes of Maro Engel and the No.2 Boutsen VDS Porsche of Alessio Picariello, with Maxwell Lynn jumping up to fifth place in his No.23 Team RJN McLaren to grab the Silver class lead.

He alongside a myriad of other cars gained a humongous amount of places due to the chaos that ensued at the start, with cars gaining as much as 41 places.

The Safety Car was of course called into action, with racing not resuming for another 18 minutes. Some cars chose to pit early, but one that did not make it out again was the No.46 Team WRT BMW of Valentino Rossi, who stopped just before the pit exit, with a clutch problem.

At the restart, Martin retained his lead with Engel and Picariello behind, the three of them building a small buffer to fourth placed Dani Juncadella in the No.3 Verstappen Racing Mercedes.

Incidents though continued throughout the field, with the No.24 Steller Motorsport and the No.71 Selected Car Racing Ferrari being spun round by competitors at the exit of the first chicane, by the No.992 Paradine Competition BMW and the No.99 ROWE Racing BMW respectively.

A short bit after the half-hour mark elapsed, Martin was hit with a three-minute stop&go penalty for causing the start pile-up. This left effective leader Engel and Picariello battling it out, as the now net third-place man Juncadella was six seconds behind them, himself keepin Silver leader Lynn at arm's length, despite the No.3 Mercedes having damage from the start, which limited its capabilities.

With the No.17 Mercedes pitting in order to serve the penalty after 21 laps, Engel lead by two seconds from Picariello, with Lynn now third as Juncadella had pitted. Subsequently Martin denied ever touching the Ferrari and thus causing the crash. After serving the penalty, GetSpeed elected to retire the car.

24 laps in and a Full Course Yellow was called, as the No.111 CSA Racing McLaren of James Kell had crashed in the barriers at turn 9, the middle of Variante Ascari. Kell eventually managed to get out of there and back to the pits.

That crash and subsequent FCY triggered a series of pitstops from third place down, with Engel and Picariello staying out for a couple more laps, pitting afterwards from the top two places, swapping drivers, with Luca Stolz and Dorian Boccolacci now behind the wheel of the No.48 and the No.2 respectively.

Meanwhile after losing a lot of time due to repairs on the bodywork, the No.3 Verstappen Racing Mercedes, now with Chris Lulham behind the wheel returned to the track, albeit all the way down to 42nd.

After the briefest of Safety Cars, racing resumed with one hour and 52 minutes to go, with the No.48 Mann-Filter Mercedes of Stolz in the lead, the No.2 Boutsen VDS of Boccolacci in second and the No.34 Walkenhorst Aston Martin of Jamie Day in third.

The No.23 Team RJN McLaren retained the Silver class lead, with Horatio Fitz-Simon now behind the wheel of the fifth overall place car, while the No.87 Winward Mercedes of Gabriele Piana was in eighth and in the Bronze class lead. Finally down in 11th lied Gold class leader Ugo de Wilde in the No.998 ROWE Racing BMW.

Quickly though third place Day and fourth place Augusto Farfus in the No.98 ROWE BMW pitted, giving third to Fitz-Simon and fourth to another Silver car, the No.25 Sainteloc Audi of Etienne Cheli.

34 laps in, the adventures of Verstappen Racing came to an end, as Chris Lulham parked the No.3 Mercedes near the exit of Variante Ascari, with smoke coming out of his car. A third caution period was called, a brief one at that, with green flag conditions resuming after only a couple of minutes, as the Mercedes was pushed to a safe zone.

After and for the next phase of the race, the top three pulled away from fourth, with Fitz-Simon around three seconds ahead of Cheli, before another incident interrupted the race.

43 laps in, Stylianos Kolovos spun and beached his No.914 Razoon Porsche at the exit of the first Lesmo, with a FCY being called.

Under that FCY a number of cars made pitstops, including all from second down to seventh, with Boutsen VDS sticking with Boccolaci in the No.2 Porsche, while Ben Döorr picked up the mantle from the impressive Fitz-Simon in the No.23 McLaren.

Luca Stolz though in the lead initially stayed out, as did Jordan Pepper in the No.32 Team WRT BMW, that had already done five pitstops up to that point, trying to gain an advantage for later on due to minimum stint length times, before the No.48 Mercedes finally pit, as the safety car was called, one hour and 47 minutes in, with Lucas Auer getting behind the wheel.

This proved to be highly detrimental to Mann-Filter's chances for the win, with Auer getting back out on track all the way down in 28th.

Credit: SRO/JEP

At the restart Pepper lead from Boccolacci and the No.35 Walkenhorst Aston Martin of Gaspard Simon, with the latter quickly losing out to Dörr and Marvin Dienst after a couple of laps.

With less than an hour to go, the top three of Pepper, Boccolacci and Dörr were in a fight amongst themselves for the win, as Marvin Dienst in the No.87 Winward Mercedes was gradually falling ever more behind in fourth overall, with the German still leading the Bronze class.

At the same time, Lucas Auer was up to 18th, still needing a huge stroke of luck to get back in contention for victory.

After 57 laps and with less than 50 minutes to go, the leading duo entered the pits, handing the overall lead to Dörr, with the No.32 Team WRT BMW now driven for the final stint by Kelvin van der Linde and the No.2 Boutsen VDS Porsche by Morris Schuring.

The pair re-entered the race down in 18th and 19th respectively, although in net lead territory, as other cars still needed to pit, but held out for a potential FCY or safety car up until the last possible moment.

This came with 22 minutes to go, just at the same moment when leader Ben Dörr entered the pits, when FCY was called due to two seperate ''fiery'' incidents. First, the No.44 Greystone GT McLaren of Tomas Pintos spun and crashed exiting the second Lesmo, leaving debris on the track but eventually getting going again, despite some fire appearing momentarily from his car.

Then seconds later the No.222 2 seas Motorsport Mercedes of Kiern Jewiss suffered a massive engine failure, leaving clouds of smoke and possibly fluids on the main straight.

This meant that after everyone that needed to pit, did, amazingly the No.66 Tresor Attempto Audi of Rocco Mazzola was now in both Silver and the overall lead, with Bronze leader Marvin Dienst in the No.87 Winward Mercedes just behind him in second.

Ben Dörr and Team RJN were third, behind three backmarkers, paying the high price for pitting only moments too early, whilst Lucas Auer was back in fourth in his No.48 Mann-Filter Mercedes.

The two of them had to quickly clear the backmarkers between them and the two leaders after the safety car period ended, with only seven minutes to go, leaving us for ready for a thrilling finale to the race.

After the restart, Mazzola held the lead despite Dienst's attempt at the first chicane, while Auer passed Dörr by pushing him towards the gravel at the exit of the second Lesmo, an incident noted by the stewards.

The final curveball of the race was thrown with only five minutes to go, when Kelvin van der Linde lost his braking in the run to turn 1, smashing into the back of a Porsche which barrel-rolled and smashed into other competitors, with second place Dienst being taken out in the process.

This massive incident meant the race ended under safety car conditions, rather anticlimactically, with the No.66 Tresor Attempto Racing of Rocco Mazzola crossing the line first, winning the race both overall and in Silver class. A huge upset for the crew that started the race only 29th overall

Second was Lucas Auer winner of the Pro class, under investigation for his incident with Dörr, while the No.555 CSA Racing McLaren of Lorens Lecertua rounded out the podium in third.

Gold class honours went to the No.71 Selected Car Racing Ferrari, that finished 15th overall in the hands of Frederik Schandorff, whilst the No.74 Kessel Racing Ferrari won the Bronze class and finished ninth overall with Dennis Marschall behind the wheel.

Race Results - Top 5

1st No.66 Tresor Attempto Racing, Audi - Mazzola, Levi, Øgaard (Silver)

2nd No.48 Mann-Filter, Mercedes - Auer, Engel, Stolz

3rd No.555 CSA Racing, McLaren - Moulin, Andriolo, Lecertua (Silver)

4th No.2 Boutsen VDS, Porsche - Schuring, Boccolacci, Picariello

5th No.98 ROWE Racing, BMW - Dennis, Marciello, Farfus