“Bleak” RLR MSport pulls off mighty recovery to P5 in troubled ELMS Portimao finale

RLR MSport pulled off a mighty recovery to fifth in a troubled European Le Mans Series (ELMS) 4 Hours of Portimao (16-18 October), which was characteristic of the team’s turbulent 2025 season.

The former ELMS LMP3 Teams Champion carried its favoured Silverstone setup forward to Portimao and driver feedback was positive straight out of the starting blocks in Official Collective Testing (Wednesday 15 October).

Free practice featured a few tentative setup tweaks in the search for marginal gains, and the #15 trio were in or around the top three from the outset, Henrion showing great pace on heavily worn tyres during FP2.

The team was openly optimistic entering Qualifying and initially secured the final pole position of 2025 following a magnificent performance by Henrion.

The swift Frenchman vaulted to the top of the leaderboard after his first attempt, but he continued to extend the envelope during another three super-special flying laps and secured his maiden ELMS pole with a stunning time of 1m37.923s.

However, pole was snatched away and RLR MSport was relegated to the back of the LMP3 grid for running a non-compliant diffuser, which was newly-installed.

This twist in the tale severely dented the team’s aspirations of closing out a tumultuous 2025 season with a podium finish but also provided even more motivation.

The requirement to start the 4 Hours of Portimao with quick pro Henrion necessitated an extra driver-change to Jensen on the opening tour of Autodromo Internacional do Algarve, and a lap was subsequently lost to the class leaders.

Jensen ran his stint and RLR MSport utilised a first-hour Virtual Safety Car (VSC) to complete a mandated timed stop, but the #15 crew was still tenth and two laps down after Adcock was inserted into the cockpit.

RLR MSport was eligible for a pass-around and recovered a lap during a second-hour VSC, and Adcock pulled back more time during a dogged stint that featured a series of stellar overtakes, including a clean lunge underneath the #11 Eurointernational at the Torre Vip hairpin.

The South Africa-domiciled Adcock gave up the #15 Ligier to Henrion as the 4 Hours of Portimao approached halftime, the young Frenchman continuing his teammate’s good work by pushing forward to fifth position before the chequered flag fell on the 2025 ELMS.

“We’ve had a winning car in two consecutive races at Silverstone and Portimao and both were ruined by external factors,” said Adcock. “The diffuser issue was very unfortunate, because Ligier was aware that lots of teams were having problems with their diffusers but didn’t do anything about it and we got disqualified.

“Starting tenth, we had to get Gillian (Henrion) out of the car as quickly as possible. However, we went a lap down after the first-lap changeover and struggled from there. Finishing fifth is bittersweet because it’s a good result but isn’t what we wanted. We all had good pace and I loved my stint.”

Adcock continued: “We have had a difficult year because the car arrived so late. We’ve had two good podiums but should have done better, and we’re all feeling a bit bleak because we had so much more potential and really wanted to defend our championship title.”

Jensen said: “It wasn’t our season. We had a DNF at Imola because of a faulty power steering pump, we got hit at Silverstone and really thought we would get a good result in Portimao when Gillian (Henrion) qualified on pole position. Sadly, we got disqualified and started last in LMP3 with Gillian in the car, which forced us to make an extra pit stop on lap one.

“To finish fifth shows we had speed. Nick (Adcock) and Gillian have been fantastic teammates, and RLR MSport has been great all year. We had all the necessary ingredients for a successful campaign but lacked a bit of luck.”

Henrion said: “The car has improved so much since Silverstone and I knew we would be capable of fighting for pole position. I kept a few things up my sleeve and showed my full potential in Qualifying, and it was enough for P1! Unfortunately, the grid relegation forced us to change drivers early and created a tricky strategy to manage. It should have worked out, but a racing incident happened one lap too late, which meant we didn’t get a pass-around. That made our strategy even harder.

“Overall, our race was good. I had some great battles and really strong pace, with a fastest lap seven-to-nine tenths quicker than everyone else, which proves that our qualifying speed was real. It also shows that, with a bit more luck, we could have achieved something truly great this season. I’m very thankful to everybody at RLR MSport for their hard work, and to Michael (Jensen) and Nick (Adcock) for their trust, commitment, super driving and motivation.”