Iberian Historic Endurance Brings the Curtain Down on the Estoril Classics

The honour of closing the ninth edition of the Estoril Classics fell to the Iberian Historic Endurance, with the spectacular and charismatic Touring, GT and prototype cars up to 1976 offering the enthusiastic crowd at the Autódromo do Estoril a lively race packed with highlights.

One of the most eagerly awaited events of the year – indeed, one of the largest classic racing gatherings worldwide – began on Saturday afternoon, when the sizeable field, bearing the Liqui Moly banner, contested the qualifying session that would set the grid for the 50-minute race.

Christian Oldendorff, who swapped his Alfa Romeo Giulia TZ2 for an equally spectacular Ford GT40, set the fastest time in qualifying and shared the front row with the Porsche 911 3.0 RS of Carlos Brízido/Miguel Lobo, the quickest pairing in the H-1976 class. The second row was filled by Belgium’s Olivier Muytjens, also in a Ford GT40, alongside Britain’s Tom Canning at the wheel of a Ginetta G10, while just behind lined up the Chevrolet Corvette LS8 of Pedro Bethencourt/Jorge Nogueira Pinto and the diminutive British-built Merlyn MK4 prototype of Carlos Barbot/Filipe Vieira de Campos.

At 5:15 p.m. on Sunday, under fine weather and pleasant temperatures in the municipality of Cascais, all forty-five cars — the maximum number authorised for this FIA Grade 1 circuit — took their places on the grid for a race with a strong strategic element, owing to the mandatory pit stop.

Christian Oldendorff made a strong start, while the Porsche of Carlos Brízido/Miguel Lobo had a far more cautious opening, leaving the challenge to the pole-sitter in the hands of Olivier Muytjens. On the second lap, the Safety Car was deployed to remove a stranded car from the track, regrouping the field. At the restart, Tom Canning’s Ginetta, the Jaguar E-Type of Rhea Sautter/Andrew Newall, the Corvette of Pedro Bethencourt/Jorge Nogueira Pinto and the Merlyn of Carlos Barbot/Filipe Vieira de Campos kept the crowd on their feet in a four-way battle, while further back endless scraps and exchanges of position continued to shape the order.

Still in the first half of the contest, Olivier Muytjens slipped down the order after a spin at Turn 1, while the Corvette succumbed. As the race clock ticked on, the action naturally settled, with Christian Oldendorff’s GT40 leading ahead of Tom Canning’s Ginetta and the Jaguar of Rhea Sautter/Andrew Newall. Close behind, the Porsche of Carlos Brízido/Miguel Lobo, the elegant Ferrari 275 GTB of Andreas Rolner/Pierre Alain Thibaut, and Laurent Jaspers’ E-Type kept the large crowd engaged in a clash of automotive giants: Porsche, Ferrari and Jaguar.

The race unfolded smoothly until the pit stops, which slightly reshaped the order without diminishing the spectacle, as the faster contenders began to lap traffic — no easy task amid constant battles and position changes in the competitive but fair field.

While Christian Oldendorff now managed his race at the front, Olivier Muytjens recovered to third place. Meanwhile, the Porsche of Carlos Brízido/Miguel Lobo — seemingly unsatisfied with simply leading the H-1976 class — overtook the “Big Cat” of Rhea Sautter/Andrew Newall. That Jaguar soon had to defend from Laurent Jaspers’ similar machine, with the latter ultimately prevailing to take the H-1965 lead on lap 15.

A Safety Car in the closing stages effectively brought the competitive fight to an early end. Christian Oldendorff, who had set the fastest lap, was the first to take the chequered flag, but a 40-second penalty for failing to respect the minimum pit stop time cost him victory. Young Tom Canning, racing a classic car for the very first time, was declared the winner, crossing the line just three-hundredths of a second ahead of Olivier Muytjens, who admitted afterwards that under normal conditions it would have been very difficult to fight for victory due to fuel supply issues with his car.

These three filled the SC & GTP podium. Also within this category, Carlos Barbot/Filipe Vieira de Campos finished just outside the rostrum but secured a worthy fifth overall, while the Lotus Seven of João Mira Gomes/Nuno Afoito — involved in several entertaining duels throughout the race — came home in seventh.

After battling his way up the order, Laurens Jaspers was the fourth to take the flag but was promoted to third, sealing victory in the H-1965 category. He was joined on the class podium by Rhea Sautter/Andrew Newall and by Brice Pineau, driving the HY Racing Shelby Cobra Daytona.

Carlos Brízido/Miguel Lobo secured an emphatic win in H-1976. João Santos and José Carvalhosa, also at the wheel of a Porsche 911 3.0 RS, claimed second place — their best-ever result in Historic Endurance — while Robin Ellis, in a Porsche 911 2.8 RSR, completed the class podium.

In H-1971, the early pace was dictated by the Touring Cars — in this case, the Alfa Romeo GT AM — with four examples from the Arese marque leading the fiercely competitive pack. In the end, it was Henry Wegener who proved strongest, the only driver not to lose ground, as he beat the Porsche 911 2.5 ST of the trio Piero Dal Maso/Guilherme Dal Maso/José Carvalhosa. The final step of the podium went to Carlos and Nuno Matos, whose clever race strategy and well-timed pit stop earned them third place in their Porsche 914/6 GT.

In the Gentlemen Driver Spirit (GDS) — open to all cars with engines up to 1300cc and Touring Cars up to 2000cc — Nuno Nunes looked set for a comfortable win in his Porsche 911 SWB, thanks to a flawless drive. However, a drive-through penalty relegated him to second place. João Neves and Francisco Gonçalves, who had been running a strong race, dicing with theoretically faster machinery, seized the opportunity and claimed a well-deserved victory. Third place was fiercely contested, with Vincent Tourneur, also in a Porsche 911 SWB, edging out the trio of Rui Bevilacqua/António Magalhães/Nuno Veiga in their Alfa Romeo Giulia Ti Super.

As always in Historic Endurance, no meeting is complete without the Index of Performance classification, calculated using a coefficient applied to each model to reward older and smaller-capacity cars. Fabiano Vivacqua Jr., driving a Porsche 356 B, celebrated his maiden triumph in Race Ready competition, receiving a superb timepiece from Cuervo y Sobrinos — the only Swiss watchmaker with a genuinely Latin heritage. The Index podium was rounded out by Rui Bevilacqua/António Magalhães/Nuno Veiga, last year’s winners, and João Neves and Francisco Gonçalves.

After the grand celebration of the Estoril Classics, which attracted 40,000 spectators over four days, the most prestigious classic car competition in Southern Europe now heads to the Algarve Classic Festival, from 24 to 26 October, for four races that promise to enliven the revitalised Algarve event.

With the Historic Endurance entry list surpassing seventy cars, the grid — the benchmark competition for Touring and GT cars up to 1976 — will be split into two separate races: Historic Endurance 1 and Historic Endurance 2.