Maserati sensationally denied Aston Martin their first 24 Hour victory in the Proximus 24 Hours of Spa after a tremendous final stint by Eric Van de Poele helped them vault past their rivals in the final hour of racing.
The Phoenix Aston Martin squad of Andrea Piccini, Jean-Denis Deletraz, Stephane Lemeret and Marcel Fassler had led from the off and with just a few hours to go looked to be on course for Aston Martin's first round the clock triumph when they pulled out a lead of over a lap on their Maserati counterparts, made up of Van de Poele, Michael Bartels and Andrea Bertolini.
However, it was home favourite Van de Poele who proved the difference between first and second for Maserati, stepping into the MC12 for the final stint over the last couple of hours and reducing a deficit of almost two minutes with stunning lap times that were over two seconds faster than anyone else on the circuit.
Before long, Maserati could smell victory and as Phoenix came into their final pit stop, Van de Poele moved into the lead for the first time since the seventh hour and duly held on for a famous victory on home soil.
It was cruel luck for Phoenix after they had led almost all of the way, with the team suffering no mechanical dramas throughout their relative domination. However, they had no answer to Maserati's late race pace and with one pit stop more than their ever closing rivals, the four-man squad had to watch as they claimed second best in a race they had led for a total of 22 hours.
Third place fell to the Belgian GLPK Corvette team, which at one point did not even look as though it would see the chequered flag when a problem saw the team forced to take on more than 100 litres of oil throughout the race to keep it running. They finished nine laps off the lead.
