Michelle Gatting, Sarah Bovy and Célia Martin kicked off the 2025 European Le Mans Series (ELMS) campaign with a hard-fought victory – the first of the Iron Dames X Porsche partnership – after stamping their authority on the four-hour contest with a commanding performance.
Célia Martin qualified on the front row for her ELMS debut at Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, less than two tenths off pole position time. Once the lights went out, the Iron Dames driver wasted no time in snatching the lead, as Célia jumped to the head of the field on the very first tour. Throughout the initial half hour of running, the French racer maintained a slim one-second gap over the #63 Iron Lynx.
By the time of the first stops just before the end of the first hour, Célia had extended her margin to around five seconds and when she re-emerged from the pits, the gap to second sat at four seconds. A Virtual Safety Car presented an opportunity for a second pit stop, but Célia remained at the wheel and retained her lead at the restart.
With an hour and 50 minutes to go, she pitted for a third and final time, handing over to Sarah Bovy, who emerged from the pits with a four-second gap to her closest competitor. Sarah got her head down in the early laps of her stint, and quickly opened the gap to 10 seconds. She then seized the opportunity to pit under VSC, but stayed behind the wheel. Sarah gave it everything to fend off the chasing pack as the race entered its final hour.
With just under 50 minutes left to run, Sarah finally dove into the pits and Michelle Gatting was unleashed for the final stint. Michelle resisted intense pressure, especially in a nail-biting two-lap shootout to draw the race to a close. After four hours of competition, she crossed the line to claim the first LMGT3 victory of the 2025 ELMS season and the first for the Iron Dames X Porsche partnership.
Michelle Gatting
Pressure seems to be quite good for me. Of course, it would've been nice to have more of a gap, but I knew the tyres would drop when they pushed too hard behind. I knew that I was more in control than they were, and I could see where I was stronger and where they were stronger, so I was trying to take advantage of that. The job that Celia and Sarah did today was amazing. I'm very happy to start the year like this, because not getting points in this race last season was one of the main reasons we missed out on the championship.
Sarah Bovy
Firstly, we've all been very concerned for Marta [García] overnight, so it was amazing to arrive at the track today and hear she had no major injuries. We just want to tell her that we won for her today. My first race as a silver was incredible. Célia did great, but when I got in the car, there was so much pressure. Michelle was there to keep me in the right mindset though; she helped me a lot with that. Today was about consistency and keeping the tyres alive and I think we all did that really well.
Célia Martin
I was trying to manage the Iron Lynx car behind me, create a gap and manage the tyres. That was the game I was trying to play; to be consistent and stay in the zone. It was a completely different approach in the ALMS races last year and earlier in 2025. That was all to gain experience for this championship and that helped me today – I really enjoyed my stints, the car was great.