18 cars are on hand for this weekend’s Blancpain Sprint Series Round at Moscow Raceway. Originally planned as a street race in the Russian Capital, a change of venue at the 11th hour by SRO means the teams are headed to the circuit which is located about 70 miles from the city centre for the first time since 2012 when the FIA GT1 series made the trip.
In terms of entry list changes, SMP Racing was set to compete with three 458 GT3s, but the team elected to sit it out in the end after the venue change. ISR Racing has also pulled its #75 Silver Cup Audi R8 which the Fjordbach brothers – Anders and Thomaas – usually pilot.
Nevertheless, RJN Motorsport have entered a black Nissan GT-R with Russian-native Mark Shulzhitskiy and GT Academy USA graduate Nick Hammann who’s making his Sprint Series debut. And the other addition to the grid comes in the form of Dutchman Max van Splunteren, who’s driving the #83 HTP Bentley with Jules Szymkowiak after Tom Dillman filled the seat at Zolder.
It looks to be a highly competitive weekend of racing as the season hits the halfway point. All eyes will be on the #1 WRT Audi R8 of Laurens Vanthoor and Robin Frijns who are looking to extend their winning to streak to five and their championship lead in tomorrow’s Qualifying Race.
Practice 1 saw Norbert Siedler in the #333 Rinaldi Racing Ferrari 458 go quickest after a 1:38.020 in the dying minutes. After the disappointment at Zolder in the Main Race – retiring on lap 1 from second on the grid – the German squad are hoping to bounce back here.
Nick Catsburg steered the #88 Reiter Engineering Lamborghini to second just 65 thousands off Seefried. Third was the #4 WRT Audi after a lap of 1:38.378 set by Frank Stippler.
The second Free Practice session saw Laurens Vanthoor set fastest lap of the day. A 1:37.501 in the opening minutes of the session put the Belgian ace top of the screens, but an off at the Turn 8 chicane with ten minutes remaining in the session damped the mood in the WRT garage. The car only sustained light damage to the left-front however and should be good to go for tomorrow.
The #2 Audi of Christopher Mies finished up second, with the #88 Reiter Engineering Lamborghini third. It was an extremely tight session, with the top 14 runners all ending up lapping within a second of each other.
Qualifying and both races are due to be held tomorrow; it’s going to be a very busy day for the teams and drivers.
Stephen Kilbey
