Jamie Chadwick shines at the Silverstone 4 Hours

IDEC Sport Silverstone 4 Hours 14/9/25

A home win for Jamie Chadwick capped a happy return for contemporary Le Mans Prototype racing to the UK, as the European Le Mans Series revived the Silverstone 4 Hours for its first running since 2019.

Healthy crowd numbers of more than 110,000 were recorded over the meeting’s three days, quenching a six-year drought for thirsty endurance racing fans, who were also lured by relatively cheap ticket prices (there’s a lesson). It is hoped the encouraging ELMS return will be a precursor to a Silverstone comeback for the World Endurance Championship – possibly in 2027 – which also last visited the UK six years ago.

This was a third ELMS victory of the campaign for Chadwick and her IDEC Sport team-mates Mathys Jaubert and Daniel Juncadella, as a well-timed switch to treaded Goodyear tyres in worsening weather turned the day in their favour.

Fans were treated to an entertaining enduro, albeit one that was interrupted by two early red flags for heavy accidents triggered by dodgy driving standards in a 44-car field for LMP2, P3 and LMGT3 machinery. Oliver Gray made the early running in the championship-leading VDS Panis Racing ORECA he shares with Esteban Masson and Charles Milesi, only to pick up a 17sec stop-go for passing the pitlane’s red light.

Nick Yelloly might also have delivered a home win. But a spin on slicks as the rain intensified handed Juncadella a lead he wouldn’t lose, despite Yelloly’s Inter Europol team-mate Tom Dillmann closing in hard pursuit. A third red flag with 8min left as conditions deteriorated curtailed the action.

That played into the hands of Lilou Wadoux. She had just lost the LMGT3 lead to fellow Ferrari driver Riccardo Pera before a red flag – but the result was called on the lap countback rule, meaning the Richard Mille 296 Wadoux shared with Custodio Toledo and Riccardo Agostini prevailed.

The overall win for Chadwick and co has left the IDEC crew six points off their VDS Panis rivals with only Portimão to come.

Driver briefing notes

Notable outings at Goodwood and the Nürburgring…

λ A good month for Tom Ingram. Having extended his BTCC points lead at Donington Park, he scooped a second consecutive RAC TT Celebration victory at the Goodwood Revival, sharing Jaguar E-type CUT 7 with Richard Kent. Ingram finished second but inherited victory via a pitstop violation penalty for Rob Huff.

λ A South American double in Paraguay and Chile has catapulted Sébastien Ogier to the top of the World Rally Championship. The 41-year-old is only two points clear of Toyota team-mate Elfyn Evans with three to play, but few would bet against him equalling Séb Loeb’s record of nine WRC crowns.

λ Kudos to Max Verstappen, who played by the rookie rules to make his race debut on the Nürburgring Nordschleife. He sat a theory test, then accepted a detuned Porsche GT4, inset – and still didn’t earn the Permit A he needs to step up to GT3. Thankfully, the organisers saw sense and granted him one anyway.