For Küpper Racing, the main focus during the race should clearly be laid on the spearhead of the team, the BMW M3 in class V6. The second car, a BMW 325i, was entered in class V4 to do some laps for testing only in preparation of the 24h Race. The joy in driving both of the cars was the reason why it finally turned out differently.
Two cars, three drivers – a challenging task in a very demanding racing series on the definitely most difficult race track of the world. A tough piece of work was lying ahead of Küpper Racing and team manager and driver Bernd Küpper from Düren at the second round of the BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft. His regular driver Benjamin Weidner (Düren) and Jochen Hudelmaier (Ehningen) who joined the team at the last race assisted him in managing this task.
Due to the fog, Race Control decided to delay the start of the practice session by 30 minutes and not to take the lap times achieved during the first hour into account for the classification. The team nevertheless started the practice in their BMW M3 entered in class V6 early on to collect first impressions. Benjamin Weidner was the first driver in the team of Küpper Racing, he completed two laps over the Grand Prix Circuit before he joined the Nordschleife for two further laps. For the reasons mentioned above, his times were however not recorded whereas the times set afterwards by Jochen Hudelmaier were shown in the classification. They were however not brilliant as the team said in their own words because the track continued to be quite wet and very slippery. When Bernd Küpper wanted to complete to his part of the session, he realized a strange handling of the BMW M3, he stopped practice and checked the suspension unit of the new race car. He discovered a worn wheel bearing of the wishbone and the team was unfortunately not able to change the part until the end of the practice session. So there was no chance to improve the grid position and the team of Küpper Racing had to start from the last position in class V6. The team manager completed only two practice laps in the race car for the 24h Race, the BMW 325i entered in class V4, in order to be eligible to start. Without pushing, the small car finished the session into the last grid position of class V4.
Benjamin Weidner was the start driver in the BMW M3, he gained many places in the big traffic of the first turns and could start to fight brilliantly. His attacks were however stopped in the middle of the second lap. Big raindrops came down and the rain was getting stronger and stronger. Weidner had to come to the pits to fit wet weather tyres. Only some minutes later, whilst team manager Bernd Küpper was on his “inspection laps” in the small sister car, he, too, had to return to the pits in the rain which caused problems at the pit both for team staff and material: It was not possible to service both cars as quickly as usual due to the traffic in the pit lane and the small period of time between the two cars of the Küpper team. After two hours on wet weather tyres under extremely bad conditions, Benjamin Weidner who was in fourth position passed the car over to his team mate Hudelmaier. The conditions slowly improved during Hudelmaier’s stint and the lap times slowly got better. The Swabian Hudelmaier completed the total of seven laps in the V6 race car of Küpper Racing. Meanwhile, team manager Küpper returned to the pits in the smaller V4 after having completed 12 laps and changed to Benjamin Weidner who hardly had any time to take a breath between his turns. He continued for another six laps in the V4 before he parked the undamaged car in the Parc Fermé. Team manager Bernd Küpper, too, finally made his turn in the BMW M3. He took over the car from Hudelmaier and set four laps before the chequered flag came out. Apart from the missed pit stop, the race was running as scheduled for the team even though the plan was to complete only a few laps in the smaller car but the team manager then spontaneously decided to use the complete race as last roll-out test for the 24h Race. The team has entered only one car, the V6 BMW M3, for the next championship round to take place on 2nd of May 2009.
