Finally they made it: After the Junior Team of the University of Applied Sciences of Cologne had already been on the podium five times this year, Nägele/Nägele/Scheerbarth finally made it right on top of the podium at the eighth round of the BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft Nürburgring. Due to the bad luck of the team Dupré/Nett, the gaps in the leading group of the championship now closed up just before the two final races.
With a lap time of 9:54.929 minutes, Dupré/Nett had almost beaten their record from the practice session in the last race, closely followed by Totz/Kreuer with 9:56.179 minutes. Totz/Kreuer lost their second position in the traffic after the start to the Junior-Team and later on, they got problems after the refuel stop. Frank Totz: “We assume there were some air blisters in the tank and I lost a lot of time due to misfirings.” The ladies crew with Schmid/Wassertheurer/Müllenmeister reported similar problems.
The advance of the leading group thus became a little more comfortable but after three hours the leading Civic of Dupré/Nett all of a sudden was missing. A wheel had loosened and the repair took too long: Their poor result finally was sixth and last place and 0.83 points only. Jürgen Nett: “Unbelievable, we had even replaced the wheel bolts before the race and then they brake just specifically in this exciting final stage of the championship.”
So the order in the end was Nägele/Nägele/Scheerbarth ahead of Totz/Kreuer and Schmid/Wassertheurer/Müllenmeister. The two Mathol vehicles with Rühl/Kittelmann and Norman/Edwards finished into positions four and five. Again, all the Honda Civic which had started the race took the chequered flag and impressively confirmed the reliability of the sporting model Type-R in endurance races.
Looking at the championship classification, it becomes apparent that there will be two exciting finals as three teams are still fighting about the title on 17th and on 31st October.
Honda Sport Cup
With 25 cars, a record entry could be noted for the 2 litres special class in which Fugel/Pflanz finished third with their Honda S2000. Still in the lead of the Sport Cup is Geulen/Kühn with their S2000 entered by the Team Schmersal and they also finished third in class SP4. Dupré/Jahn/Nett closed the gap to the leaders as finishing sixth, they gained two points more with their Honda Accord in class V4 due to the greater number of competitors. Volin/Tsarev/Vertunov with their Civic are now shown into third cup position. Weber/Bermes had to retire, just as Nawotka/Grundmann. The team Rikli could not start the race in the Accord from the Procar Series due to an accident in practice but Lötscher/Fischer/Rikli at least took the chequered flag with the Civic.
