Photo : DR / ACO

 

Although for most of his career, Stéphane Ortelli was a Porsche man, it's with Audi that he was crowned champion last Sunday. But the Hyères, France native is no stranger to the four rings marque, taking part in the 1999 and 2000 Le Mans 24 Hours for Audi's R8 debut in LM P1, before racing for the Bentley project in 2001.

In 2002 prototypes gave way to the prestigious Porsche SuperCup, which he would eventually win after a few attempts. In the same period, Ortelli won two FIA-GT crowns (at the time, it was not classified as a World Championship title), in the N-GT class in 2002 and 2003. The Monegasque would experience one of the highlights of his career in 2003, with Romain Dumas and Marc Lieb, by winning the 24 Hours of Spa in the Manfred Freisinger Porsche: a "little" N-GT had beaten the powerful GTs to take top honours.

Still competiting in the FIA-GT in 2004, he also took part in the new Le Mans Series, becoming runner up champion in GT, before taking the LM GT1 class title in 2007 with Oreca's Saleen. It's impossible to mention Stéphane Ortelli without talking about the crash that "launched" him around the Internet in 2008. At Monza, Ortelli made headlines when his Oreca cartwheeled end over end at the first chicane, just narrowly avoiding contact with Allan McNish in the Audi. The footage was seen the world over, but luckily Stéphane Ortelli escaped with only minor injuries, but nonetheless kept him from taking part in that year's Le Mans 24 Hours after 12 years of consecutive participations.

In 2008, Allan McNish won his second Le Mans 24 Hours, ten years after his frist, with Laurent Aïello and... Stéphane Ortelli ! The trio  gave the Porsche GT1 the win, against most prognostics. Ironically, Stéphane Ortelli became FIA-GT World Champion a few days after his old teammate Allan McNish, who had his third success at Le Mans this year, was crowned FIA World Endurance Champion, with Audi! Small world in the end.

Cécile Bonardel / ACO - Translated by Rainier Ehrhardt / ACO