With its eighth place finally, the Wochenspiegel Team Manthey (WTM-Racing) again achieved a top position at the first championship race of the BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft 2009, the 56th Westfalenfahrt. The gap between Georg Weiss, Michael Jacobs and Peter-Paul Pietsch and the winning Manthey Porsche 997 GT3 RSR of Marcel Tiemann / Timo Bernhard at the end of the race was 5.27,815 minutes.
In practice, the reliable Wochenspiegel Porsche 997 GT3 entered in class SP7 set a lap time of 8.42,296 minutes and was found in 16th position on the grid. Georg Weiss: “Properly speaking, we did want to do better today but an endurance race has so far never been decided in practice already. As always, we count on our constant performance again.”
Start driver Peter-Paul Pietsch drove the Porsche up into fourth position and also achieved fastest lap time of the day in the team: 9.39,081 minutes. Georg Weiss was then able to set constant lap times in the Wochenspiegel-Porsche and kept the car easily on top ten places. Michael Jacobs who took over the final turn already had sixth position in sight before he had to proceed to the pits for a short refuel stop in the very last lap. Georg Weis: “Due to the new regulations, we have a reduced fuel tank capacity this year and it was therefore not quite clear how often we would need to refuel. For safety reasons, we decided to do an additional stop today.“
Georg Weiss: „I cannot yet assess the result finally. On the one hand, I am happy that we made it to the finish again. On the other hand, I would however have expected a better result. But the season ahead of us is long and our turn will come.”
Peter-Paul Pietsch: „Fortunately, we were not as slow as I had been afraid of. You can feel the changes in the regulations but not too heavily. I hope we will further move up during the season.”
Michael Jacobs: „It was great fun although the result can still be improved. Anyhow, the Wochenspiegel-Porsche has at least again demonstrated its reliability.”
