Experience and speed – these were the decisive factors at the 49th ADAC Reinoldus-Langstreckenrennen for the first victory of Audi in the history of the BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft Nürburgring. Together with the two ex-champions Frank Biela (Monaco) and Hans-Joachim Stuck (Austria), Marc Basseng (Leutenbach) celebrated the triumph of the Audi R8 LMS entered by Phoenix Racing. Having scored 20 overall victories since 2004, the 30 years old race driver currently is the most successful driver in Europeans most popular endurance racing championship. Chris Mamerow (Castrop-Rauxel) und Dirk Werner (Kissenbrück) took the chequered flag into second position with a gap of 41.331 seconds behind the race winners. Uwe Alzen (Betzdorf) and Lance David Arnold (Duisburg) became third in their Cup-Porsche and thus finished on the podium again. Due to adverse weather conditions at the Nordschleife, the red flag was shown in lap 25 and this fifth round of the 2009 season was stopped in advance. The classification was based on the result after lap 23. “An absolutely correct decision”, attested drivers’ spokesman and team director Johannes Scheid (Kottenborn) Race Control.
”That was bloody good”, commented Volkswagen Motorsport representative Stuck after the finish. “A fantastic feeling to be able to celebrate this historical moment together with Frank and Marc.” Basseng, too, was aware of the importance of this result. “The fog has lifted finally – it is a great experience for me to celebrate this victory with two such experienced race drivers.” With this victory at the 49th ADAC Reinoldus-Langstreckenrennen, the Phoenix trio stopped the series of nine successive victories scored by Porsche. “My stint was the fastest I ever did at the Nordschleife”, Basseng added. “It is extremely great fun to drive the Audi R8 at the Nordschleife and I am sure that this was not the last triumph under the marque emblem with the four rings.
With a brilliant time of 8:09.748 minutes, Dirk Adord (Hennef) in the Ford GT Raeder-Motorsport gained the first pole position in the team history. The spectacular GT3 race car was dominating the race at the beginning. Hermann Tilke (Aachen) was not able to defend their lead but a place on the podium was in reach for the first time. Unfortunately, the team finally finished into fourth position only. “The stopping of the race was a disadvantage for us as we had stopped at the pits just before the signal came and we were thus shown into fourth place only after lap 23”, informed Adorf. “However, I fully support the decision taken by Race Control. They have done everything right – and we were just missing a little bit of luck in the end.” Class GT3 was won by the second placed team composed of Mamerow and Werner. Due to a very good race strategy, the duo in the Porsche 911 Cup was close to gaining a second overall victory in the 2009 season. “We can only win over the whole distance as our race car is not as powerful in direct comparison with our competitors”, explained Mamerow. “We had therefore decided to follow a two stop strategy and I think that our plans would have succeeded if the race had run over the complete distance.”
With position three, Alzen and Arnold continue from where they stopped the fourth round of the BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft Nürburgring: A strong result in a Cup-Porsche which is not as powerful as the other top race cars. “I am more than happy”, said Arnold gladly. “In five races, I finished up to now four times on the podium. We were at our limits again during today’s race – there were no reserves at all.” Team director Alzen again was fully convinced of the potential of the Cup-Porsche: “I think that the relation between power and lap times achieved by Lance and me couldn’t be any better.”
Marco Schelp is semi-season champion
The Manthey-Team which had dominated the 2009 season so far with three victories retired in lap 6 after a gearbox failure in their Porsche 911 GT3 RSR and regular driver Marcel Tiemann (Monaco) thus lost his lead in the championship. After his fourth victory with the MBW Z4 entered by Dörr-Motorsport in the class of VLN Specials up to 3.000 cc displacement, Marco Schelp now is the semi-season champion in the BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft. The race driver from Berlin scored 46.49 points and is now 0.53 points ahead of Rolf Derscheid (Much) and Michael Flehmer (Overath) who have gained three class victories and two second places in the class of VLN production cars up to 1.800 cc displacement and they are still within reach of beating the leader. The current champion team Black Falcon with drivers Alexander Böhm (Kelberg), Christer Jöns (Ingelheim) and Sean Paul Breslin (Great Britain) are into third championship position.
The Cup classes in this fifth championship race were dominated by well known faces again. Whilst Dennis and Marc Busch (Hemsbach) celebrated their fourth triumph in the Seat Leon Supercopa and Christoph Dupré (Schiffweiler) in the Honda Civic-Cup respectively, Karl Brinker (Herne) scored his third successive victory in the Renault Clio Cup.
The 6h ADAC Ruhr-Pokal-Rennen to take place on 18th July is scheduled to be the highlight of the BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft Nürburgring. The fans can look forward to exciting action on the race track at the “Green Hell” and also to additional surprises around the Nürburgring circuit. Further information will be published shortly on the official website www.nuerburgring-langstrecken-serie.de.
