Welcome to Who? What? Where? When? Why? on the World Wide Web. Your comments, criticism and suggestions: editors#8w.forix.com (replace # with @).

8W is forix.autosport.com's motorsport history section and covers the drivers, cars, circuits, eras and technology that shaped the face, sounds and smells of motor racing.

Who?

DRIVER BIOGRAPHIES

What?

CONSTRUCTOR PROFILES

Where?

TRACK RECORDS

When?

SEASONS' PORTRAITS

Why?

TECHNICAL FOCUS

2025 Spa Six Hours report
Original victory

Author

• Mattijs Diepraam

Date

• September 29, 2025

Related articles

• Spa - The Transit-and-trailer revival, 2006 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Inhaling enthusiasm, 2008 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - A different world, 2009 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Rain, beer and champagne, 2010 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam/Frank van de Velde
• Spa - Agreeable circumstances, 2011 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam/Frank van de Velde
• Spa - Frantic action under the sun, 2012 Spa Classic report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Taking on the GT40s, 2013 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Tropical Spa… but in the rainy season!, 2014 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - An old-fashioned one, 2015 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Before the rain, 2016 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Nightmare morphs into fairytale, 2017 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - That five-and-a-half hour sprint race on a Saturday night…, 2018 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Slippery when wet, 2019 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Endurance revival, 2021 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - The Dutch double up, 2022 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam
• Spa - Nightmares and fairytales, 2023 Spa Six Hours report, by Mattijs Diepraam

Who? Diogo Ferrão/Martin Stretton What? Ford GT40 Where? Spa When? 2025 Spa Six Hours (September 26, 2025)

Why?

Despite the field once again having shrunk a bit compared to previous years, the Spa Six Hours remains an event that attracts people – both on and off the track. After six hours of multiple cars sustaining heavy damage and a barrage of safety cars, the 2025 edition was ultimately won by the Ford GT40 shared by Portuguese-British duo Diogo Ferrão and Martin Stretton, the latter managing to hold off the remarkably quick Ginetta G4R of Danish trio Pedersen/Weiss/Kjaergaard despite a splash-and-dash at the end.

In the Spa Six Hours thirty-plus years of existence, this was Stretton’s fifth win, now putting him level with the great Simon Hadfield, who was among the first to come over and congratulate his fellow great driver-preparer from the days that Hadfield and Stretton along with Rob Hall and Andy Wolfe were the Big Four everyone in historic motor racing wanted to race against. Hadfield and Wolfe were in the race as well, but no longer in a winning GT40, but Stretton showed there is plenty of life in the old dog yet after having to wait for 11 years to equal his former nemesis’ tally. Memory drifts back to the dramatical conditions at the end of the 2014 edition, when Stretton and the other podium finishers had to collect their trophies on Sunday morning at the office of organiser Roadbook as the mother of all Ardennes thunderstorms had transformed the pitlane into a raging river of rainwater.

Ferrão and Stretton’s machine was one of only three GT40s to cross the finish line without any major issues, while the other 13 encountered all sorts of problems or were forced to retire. As usual, this opened the way for the pursuing Lotus Elans, one of which appeared on the overall podium last year, but this time Gordon Shedden and Rory Butcher – now joined by Andy Priaulx – were unable to repeat the feat. They were the fastest Elan in fifth place, though, coming out on top in a fierce battle with the Shaun Lynn/Max Lynn/Andrew Haddon example. But just like in 2024, the Ginetta of Palle Birkelund Pedersen, Alexander Weiss and Nicolaj Kjaergaard posed the biggest threat to the GT40s. Earlier this year, the three Danes won the Spa Three Hours as well as the traditional evening race at the Nürburgring, both while showing shocking superiority, so Pedersen, Weiss and Kjaergaard were rightly considered to be among the favourites beforehand. In fact, last year the ultra-quick trio led the race before being eliminated by mechanical failure, and essentially, this year they should have won it. However, losing no less than a lap and a half at the refuelling station put an end to their hopes.

More than ever, the Spa Six Hours was a lottery, with four safety car periods in the first hour alone, some lasting as long as ten minutes – a trend that continued throughout the race. After the tenth caution period, most spectators had lost count. Also, with two safety cars on the track, it would depend on which of the two picked you up, which could easily cost you an additional minute and a half. On top of that, refuelling at the circuit’s petrol station further increased the importance of good fortune, especially this time, after one of the four pumps failed and then a second one shortly afterwards – just as the Danes were queuing for that particular pump and were forced to join the other queues at the back. The Ginetta crew, who only had to make one stop, subsequently dropped from first to eighth place, but still fought their way back to second position.

Towards the end, they seemed to have a chance of winning after all when Stretton was called in for a splash-and-dash. This did not seem necessary for the GT40s due to the large number of safety cars, but apparently a small calculation error had been made at the first stop. Lady Luck smiled on Stretton when, at that very moment, the safety car came out yet again, this time because of a lengthy oil trail reaching from Eau Rouge to Malmédy, which took ten minutes to clear. To make matters worse, the Ginetta was picked up by the second safety car, so as a result the GT40 in fact came out with an even bigger lead. Stretton then controlled the race until the finish.

It was a salient detail that the winning GT40 was one of the few original examples that had taken the start. This added to the satisfaction of the winners, who looked back on the few years when not a single original GT40 had appeared at all. The two German GT40s of Michael Funke/Luco Sanchez/Nick Salewsky and Marcus von Oeynhausen/Nico Verdonck/Andy Newall finished third and fourth after battling for the lead in the opening hours. The David Hart/Nicky Pastorelli/Olivier Hart GT40 was also in contention despite a drive-through penalty and an additional stop due to a driver-pit miscommunication. Nonetheless, Olivier Hart had fought his way back up to second place during the final stint when the engine failed. This meant that they were unable to repeat their 2022 victory.

In the touring car class, a Dutch trio did claim victory, but it was not the crew that were seen as the favourites. Christiaen van Lanschot and Karsten Le Blanc were fully expected to do well with their new teammate Roger Wills, but their Ford Falcon had to retire to the pits with an oil leak very early on. It used the remaining hours to drive back up into the top 40 without encountering any further problems, but it had to leave the fight for class victory to the Mustangs. Two Dutch cars battled it out with Luxembourg trio Bob Kellen/Yann Munhowen/Max Schiltz, with Adriaans/Van Lieshout dominating for a long time. First, a drive-through penalty threw their Mustang back, and then the clutch failed. However, the Ties Meeuwissen/Jac Meeuwissen/Bas Jansen pony took up the gauntlet, as Jansen dug his heels in and slowly but surely reeled in the Luxembourg Mustang to take the lead in the final hour to never relinquish it.

In the end, some 50 cars made it to the finish line. Despite a few minor collisions, most safety cars were caused by mechanical issues that left oil spills on the track, as well as single-car accidents, some of which occurred even during an existing safety car situation. For example, the Triumph TR4 driven by Belgian duo Paul & Jordan Lejeune lost a wheel coming out of Rivage to rolled over twice. Fortunately, the driver got out unscathed, and in fact, the car didn’t all too damaged either!

Despite the familiar large turnout on Saturday, the event was once again less impressive than in previous years in the days leading up to it. This had much to do with the organiser’s unfathomable decision to end the event with the highlight while devoting the Sunday to a – no doubt lucrative – track day. The result, though, is that the main event and its support programme are bleeding because of it. Ending with the Six Hours itself does make sense on an emotional level, but from a business point of view it does not – at least not for every competitor in the support programme. These days, the official timetable starts on Wednesday, with the first races already taking place on Thursday. This particularly affects the Mom & Dad teams from abroad – read: the UK – who need to sacrifice an entire working week – Monday to pack and prepare, Tuesday to travel, Wednesday to set up and test, Thursday to qualify, and Friday and Saturday to race.

Apart from that, many Six Hours entrants are keeping their powder dry by no longer entering their steeds for any other races on the weekend – which many of them did when Masters Historic Racing provided the bulk of the support programme, with races on Sunday for Masters Gentlemen Drivers and Masters Pre -66 Touring Cars. In those two races, the pre-66 GTs and touring cars that had survived it through the Six Hours could battle it out for another 90 and 60 minutes respectively – that’s value for money for your trip to the Ardennes! When those races were moved to the Saturday, most drivers elected against entering those, preferring not to risk their cars ahead of the main event, after which, in recent years, the two Masters grids were merged into one to at least have one grid with decent numbers – but then Masters decided against including the Six Hours weekend in their calendar fort his year, instead preferring to end the season with two race weekends in the Emirates. While those were ultimately cancelled, which makes the story even sadder, Six Hours organiser Roadbook suddenly had a big hole to fill in its programme.

Motor Racing Legends stepped up with two GT3 Legends races, which were well worth watching, even though Australian Graham Davidson had an easy canter to both wins in his Aston Martin Vantage V12. MRL also returned with its Pre-War Sportscars and the combined RAC Woodcote & Stirling Moss Trophy, but sadly the latter grid is now a shadow of its former glory compared to the golden days of the previous decade, when 40 to 50 cars would make an appearance. Fred Wakeman and Chris Ward (Cooper-Jaguar T38) won this year's race against 13 other cars, while Paul Pochciol/James Hanson's D-type took the Woodcote Trophy spoils. In Pre-War Sports Cars, Rüdi Friedrichs' nimble Alvis Firefly came out on top, ably seconded by Charlie Martin on this occasion.

In addition, Roadbook attempted to fill the void left by Masters’ 3-litre F1 grid by organising two F1 races of its own. This seemed promising, especially since Roadbook frontman Vincent Collard is already working with Diogo Ferrão – indeed, this year's Six Hours winner – through their Spa Three Hours collaboration at the Spa Summer Classic. Ferrão is in charge of Race Ready, the major historic promoter on the Iberian peninsula as well as organiser of the Peter Auto weekend at Estoril, where Ferrão has been hosting his own F1 races for many years now, with in 2025 a record number of 28 cars appearing on his entry list – all cars from owners who were uninterested in making the trip to the Emirates. Putting two and two together, Collard and Ferrão offered a package deal for Spa and Estoril, but due to the short interval between the two events, few took up the offer. Six cars was the meagre result, reduced to three for the two races after various technical setbacks during testing and qualifying.

This resulted in the remarkable sight of Paul Tattersall as the winner on the podium on Friday – all on his own, as the Ensign N179 was the only car to finish. The Brit, who is happy tob e a backmarker at Masters and simply be part of the show, happily accepted the gift – no matter how you looked at it, Tattersall was now an F1 winner at Spa! On Saturday, Michael Lyons' Hesketh 308E and John Spiers' March 761 did finish the race, so Tattersall was awarded his expected third place in a race that had been shortened to ten minutes.

And so, the real F1 spectacle had to come from the Historic Grand Prix Car Association for GP cars up to 1966 – and fortunately, the association delivered in abundance. In two great races, Tim Child (Brabham BT3/4) and Rüdi Friedrichs (Cooper T53) shared the victories, but their wins did not come without a fight. Friedrichs started both races in the lead, but on Friday, Child ultimately proved too strong for the German. For the home crowd, it was great to see Maxime Castelein in his Lotus 18 reach the overall podium, the first time in a long time for a Belgian to do so.

The second race was all about Michel Kuiper’s magnificent comeback. The Dutchman had finished fourth in the first race and was initially relegated to seventh in the chaos of the opening laps on Saturday. He seemed bottled up for the first half of the race, but eventually the gaps appeared, allowing Kuiper to chase down Friedrichs, who had managed to break away at the front. With big strides – and fastest lap of the race – the Brabham BT4 closed in on the German's Cooper, but Kuiper did not dare to overtake Friedrichs, who defended well towards the end, while Castelein finished third again.

The rest of the ‘Masters gaps’ in the programme came from all over Europe. The Italians provided the Alfa Revival Cup, with a show duel between Ambrogio and Daniele Perfetti for the lead, but an unexpected five-second time penalty for Daniele threw their orchestrated photo finish into disarray – not Daniele was declared the winner, but Ambrogio... From Germany came the FHR with its two GT and touring car championships for pre-66 and pre-81 cars respectively. François Rivaz (Chevron B19) won the pre-81 race up, while Oliver Hartmann’s quick Elva MkVIII S came out on top in the pre-66 race.

The British sent the Classic Sports Car Club with their Classic K and Swinging Sixties classes, which entered into a one-off collaboration with the German-based British HTGT series. Steve Osborne's E-type won both races with ease. The 1000cc F3 screamers also came over from the UK, with Peter de la Roche in Alexis Mk17 winning the first race as expected. However, the second race produced a surprise, as Ross Drybrough (Merlyn Mk14A) triumphed after a fierce battle with Jason Timms (Brabham BT21) and Christoph Widmer (Brabham BT18A).

However, the Dutch-based Youngtimer Touring Car Challenge proved once again to be the big crowd favourite. With no fewer than three races, the YTCC not only filled the biggest gap in the programme, but with 75 cars, organiser Randall Lawson's grid also filled the asphalt to capacity. On Thursday evening, the field had to contend with the only serious rain of the entire race weekend, but that only added to the spectacle. Alex Taylor won in his TVR Tuscan, followed by Piers Masarati's Porsche, Mike Manning's Ford Sierra Cosworth RS500 and another Porsche, driven by Armand Adriaans. Behind Roel Schmitz (Porsche 964 RS) and Björn Hees (BMW M3), young Charlotte Verkuijlen drove her modest BMW Compact to a solid seventh place and a victory in the 90s class.

In dry conditions, the odds took a change – on Friday, Masarati, Felix Haas' Morgan MMC4 and the Sierras of Ashley Shelswell and Michael Schneider fought hard for victory, eventually finishing in that order, while Haas and Masarati battled for top honours once again on Saturday morning. This time, however, it went to Stephen Scott Dunwoodie's Sierra. Verkuijlen's 318i Compact took another class victory with a remarkable sixth place overall, beating Thomas Holst Karvonen's Porsche 996 Cup. The Dane had come out on top in race 2.

The full event gallery