Manthey scores their first win of the season
The Eifel mountains greeted the 168 cars with typical weather, cold temperatures, rain and fog in the morning. The fog prompted race control to postpone qualifying by about half an hour and even when the lights went green there was no chance for fast laptimes. Getting everything out of its Dunlop raintires it was Uwe Alzen who put his BMW Z4 GT3 on Pole Position, just in comparison his 9:32.913 minutes lap was about 90 seconds slower than his record setting lap earlier this season.
In second position we found another Dunlop shod racer with the Rowe-Racing Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3. Third went to the Frikadelli Racing Porsche ahead of the Twin Busch Audi R8 LMS ultra. Showing once again that he is a force to be reckoned with in the rain it was Christian Menzel aboard the Manthey Racing Porsche 911 GT3 Cup in fifth.
At the start of the race the track was still wet but in parts it was drying off, the question was when would the rain return and what tires should we use for the start? Most of the field decided to go for wet tires but some of them dared to use slicks. It was Philipp Wlazik that lead the field to the green flag and was able to take the lead, right behind him Nico Bastian aboard the Rowe-SLS was pressing on. Bastian was able to take the lead on the opening when Wlazik slid of the road at Hedwigshöhe. The Alzen-Z4 was sub sequentially retired, another race to forget for the squad of Uwe Alzen.
At the lead of the pack it was Nico Bastian who was able to put a substantial margin between himself and the pack, which was lead by the Audi R8 of the twins Marc and Dennis Busch. In third it was Christian Menzel ahead of the Walkenhorst Motorsport powered by Dunlop Z4 GT3, driven by Daniela Schmid.
A surprising sixth was the Audi TT-RS of Ulli Andree and Christian Krognes, last years VLN champions took advantage of their front wheel drive and that they had a free road ahead in the opening laps. In lap three the Busch Audi stranded at Bergwerk with a technical problem.
After laps two and three most of the teams that went with rain tires at the start of the race dived for pitlane to change for slicks, but this decision proved to be one without merit as the rain soon returned forcing them to take a additional pitstop. Nico Bastian was one of the drivers that was out on slick tires and could build up a sizeable lead over Christian Menzel, about two and a half minute at some point. But when the rain returned Bastian crashed the car on the Breidscheid bridge taking out the Rowe-SLS. With now all of the teams diving for the pitlane to take on rain tires it was the LMS TT-RS finding it self in the lead.
But from the back of the pack it was the Manthey-Racing Porsche 911 GT3 RSR charging through the pack, Jochen Krumbach started on slicks in P20 and when the rain returned after about an hour he dived for the pitlane to hand the car over to Lucas Luhr, who went back out on rain tires. Both Luhr and Christian Menzel, who were still aboard the Manthey Cup Car, were able to go by the LMS TT-RS.
At mid distance it was the Manthey-RSR in the lead ahead of its Cup-Car sister, still with Christian Menzel at the wheel, and the Walkenhorst-Z4. In fourth it was the LMS TT-RS ahead of the GetSpeed Performance Porsche 911 GT3 Cup. At this time the rain had partially stopped and the track started to dry off one again, but of course it started to rain again with about an hour to go.
When rain hit once again big time with about ten minutes to go race control decided to stop the race with the red flag and it was a drive home victory for Manthey-Racing, their first with the new 4,4 Liter engine. Remarkable the victory also marked the 500th group victory for Porsche.
A feat that made Olaf Manthey especially proud: “VLN always has been my home series, so I’m extremely proud to score this victory for Porsche.” His drivers Lucas Luhr, Jörg Bermeister and Jochen Krumbach were also visibly happy with the first Manthey-victory of the season, over 500 days after the team scored their last VLN victory in April of 2012.
“We took a gamble at the star by using slick tires but in the end it paid off for us. When we took the lead we didn’t look back, but we still had to keep up concentration in these conditions,” said Jochen Krumbach.
A fine second went to Wolfgang Kohler and Christian Menzel in their Manthey Cup-Porsche. Menzel, did the majority of the driving duties and only handed over to Kohler in the closing laps. Christian Menzel was exhausted after the race but still happy with his result: “I have done so many laps around the Nordschleife but for these kind of conditions I still need to bring my A game and so it was pretty exciting today. You have to stay concentrated all the time.”
The fight for third went down to the wire, with the GetSpeed Performance Porsche 911 keeping the Walkenhorst Z4 at bay to score a fine third place finish for Dominik Brinkmann, Steve Jans and Adam Osieka.
“I’m really happy with our third place finish but as we only scored a second place in our class it might hurt my chances at the championship, we will see,” realized Osieka. The Walkenhorst Z4 crossed the line just around four seconds behind the 911 and one place ahead of the Haribo Racing Porsche. The at one time race leading Audi TT-RS of Ulli Andree and Christian Krognes finished in a fine sixth place, taking home SP3T class honours.
The next VLN race takes place on September 28th.
Soren Herweg
