Corvette led Ferrari home once again at the Nürburgring on Sunday, but this time it was Maxime Soulet and Nick Catsburg’s #6 Selleslagh Racing Team Corvette that triumphed, ahead of Roman Mavlanov and Daniel Zampieri in the #60 SMP Racing Russian Bears 458, who scored their second runner-up finish of the weekend.
It was almost a lights-to-flag victory for the #6 car, although Nicky Pastorelli in the #2 snuck into the lead briefly on Lap 1 before Soulet reasserted himself at the head of the field.
The pair of Corvettes pulled away from third-place starter Mavlanov, who had his hands full keeping Mirko Venturi in the Black Bull Swiss Racing Ferrari behind him in the opening laps.
Further back, fifth-place starter Niccolo Schirro had a train forming behind his Villorba Corse Ferrari, and soon lost two places to Federico Leo in the #55 AF Corse Ferrari and Thomas Jäger in the #70 Lechner Racing Mercedes. GTS-class runners Peter Kox and Matt Griffin (Reiter Lamborghini and AF Corse Ferrari respectively) had a harder time getting past Schirro’s upgraded Super GT-class GT3 car, allowing Leo and Jäger to build a gap in front of Schirro.
Pastorelli stayed right behind Soulet for the entire first stint, and once or twice looked like he was thinking about a lunge down the inside into Turn 1. Soulet kept up the pace, however, and Pastorelli eventually decided to come in early in the pit window to hand over to Miguel Ramos.
Just before the stops on Lap 12, Venturi snuck past Mavlanov at the hairpin, while the same tour also saw Griffin take Kox down the inside of Turn 1 for eighth overall.
They were both however still behind Schirro’s Ferrari, which was another early stopper to hand over to Andrea Montermini.
The rest of the frontrunners left it until just before the end of the window to make their driver changes. When things shook out afterwards, Catsburg in the #6 Corvette held a 12-second lead over Zampieri in the #60 Russian Bears Ferrari (Mavlanov’s Italian co-driver having repassed the #64 Black Bull Ferrari, now in the hands of Joel Camathias).
With the #2 Corvette taking a longer pitstop due to winning on Saturday, Ramos emerged in fifth place overall behind Montermini.
Most of the action in the second half of the race took place in the GTS class, which was initially led after the stops by Jäger’s co-driver Mario Plachutta in the #70 Mercedes (sixth overall), with Claudio Sdanewitsch just behind in the #55 AF Corse Ferrari that had been started by Leo.
Spanish young gun Alain Sicart in the #63 Ombra Racing Ferrari quickly passed Sdanewitsch to move from third to second in class, dropping the latter into the clutches of Dylan Derdaele in the #99 V8 Racing Corvette. Sicart then dispatched Plachutta without much trouble to take the class lead, while both Dylan Derdaele and Team Novadriver Audi man Cesar Campanico overhauled the floundering Sdanewitsch to move up to second and third in class before very long.
That wasn’t the end of the GTS fight, though, as 2011 Nürburgring 24 Hours winner and multiple Le Mans veteran Andrea Piccini was now on a mission in the #56 AF Corse Ferrari that had been driven by Giorgio Roda in the first stint. In the last 20 minutes of the race, he moved from fifth in GTS to the class lead, passing Sdanewitsch, Plachutta, Campanico and Derdaele, before finally overcoming Sicart with a well judged move under braking into Turn 1 on the final lap.
Ahead of this, Montermini grabbed third from Camathias going through the final chicane on Lap 24. Camathias was then caught by Ramos, who nerfed him into a spin in Turn 1 on the last lap to take fourth overall, but the Swiss Racing Ferrari was able to continue to finish sixth at the flag.
Campanico and Derdaele meanwhile battled furiously for the final GTS podium position, crossing the line almost side-by-side, but Derdaele held on to the place by just one tenth of a second.
The result was put beyond any doubt when Campanico received a post-race penalty for not applying the correct handicap time during his car’s pitstop.
Up front, leader Catsburg had only to deal with a racy Tomas Enge trying to unlap himself in 16th position in the closing stages, while Zampieri had a solid but uneventful run to second overall ahead of Montermini, who completed the overall and Super GT-class podiums.
Race result – here
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