The team managers in the Opel Astra OPC Cup had to take difficult decisions at the second round of the VLN endurance racing championship: The changing weather conditions made the 40th DMB 4 Hour Race to become a true tyre poker. The best choice finally made the current champions Jürgen and Heinz-Otto Fritzsche who are this year sharing the cockpit of the Cup Astra with Hanno Luostarinen from Finland. After the four hour race duration, Jürgen Fritzsche took the chequered flag with his Cup Astra with start number 353 in first position and secured the first victory of the season for his team Ti-Tarvike-Racing in this popular Opel one make cup. “You have to enjoy the victories as they come”, said Otto Fritzsche at the prizegiving ceremony. “All of our competitors want to beat us, and they are really competitive.” Mario Merten, Jürgen Nett and Marc Legel finished second behind the winners. The podium was completed by Alexander Schula and Willi Hüppi who had been in the lead of the race for quite a while but then dropped temporarily down into fourth place.
The starting grid of the second championship round already caused a headache for the team strategists as the question was which would be the best tyre choice. Rain tyres? Semi slicks? The later winners decided to start on rain tyres. But in the formation lap already, Heinz-Otto Fritzsche realized that this had not been the best decision and came straightaway back to the pits to change tyres. Alexander Schula in the Cup Astra with start number 339 meanwhile pulled away in the lead and gained a comfortable advantage. “We thought the weather would not dramatically change for our second stint and abided by the regrooved slicks”, explains Schula’s team mate Hüppi. But then it started to rain and the driver now duo dropped back into fourth position. In the end they benefited from the bad luck of some other competitors and finally succeeded in finish third.
The routine and experience of the later winners helped them to move into the lead, they did not make any further mistakes in their tyre choice and secured their first place. “Our experience was definitely an advantage under the prevailing conditions”, admitted Heinz-Otto Fritzsche at the finish. “And you also need that little bit of luck of course. If we are going to win another eight times, we will be more than delighted”, he described the modest target of the driver trio for the remaining races of the season.
Happy about their final result were also Mario Merten, champion in the 2013 Opel Astra OPC Cup, and Jürgen Nett. They finished second with their Cup race car displaying start number 350, even though the Astra of the team Bonk Motorsport lost a lot of time due to an extra lap at the Grand Prix Circuit after Marc Legel had missed the pit lane entry. The three drivers were fortunately able to make up the loss out on the track. “It was not looking really good for a while, but finally everything worked out perfectly”, was the summary of Jürgen Nett. “We missed our weather spies today, our tyre choice at the start was not really the best one.”
Bad luck at the second round had Robin Strycek and Moritz Oestreich. With their fastest time in the timed practice and the fastest lap time in race 2, the sons of the former DTM drivers Volker Strycek and Markus Oestreich gained additional championships points. Strycek and Oestreich were in a promising second race position when, shortly before the race end, Oestreich stopped on the track due to lack of fuel. “This is the worst case you can imagine”, said Strycek. “Moritz was incredible fast today and we had a fantastic race. It is of course very annoying that our super performance did not result in the appropriate result. But that’s part of the game.” Some comfort for Robin Strycek definitely was that, together with his father Volker, he won in class VT2 – of course in an Opel.
The next round of the Opel Astra OPC Cup will take place in only two months. The 57th ADAC ACAS H&R Cup race on 20 June 2015 will run over the usual four hours race duration for the Opel teams. The calendar of some of the Cup participants, however, includes the classical long distance race ADAC Zurich 24h Race Nürburgring that will already take place in less than three weeks’ time.
