The probably hottest VLN race since years spoiled another top position for the Renault Clio around Karl Brinker. The fastest of all Clios was stopped by an electronic problem in the control unit, caused by the extraordinary big heat.
After the successful start of the season, the Ring-Racing team was very confident to achieve another top position with their Clio. The weather conditions at the Nürburgring, though, upset the plans of the team from Boxberg. Hardly ever before had it been that hot at a VLN round as during the ADAC-Reinoldus-Langstreckenrennen.
In practice, Karl Brinker had set the fastest time ever of a Renault Clio at the hot asphalt track of the Nordschleife (9:29.110 minutes), and in the race he was also able to follow the pace of the more powerful SP3 Opel and BMW cars. Last but not least due to the once again perfectly working BILSTEIN suspension as well as due to the latest stage of engine development, Brinker went into the lead amongst the group of the compact cars from France. Whilst the powerful Renault engine was working perfectly again, some problems in the Clio started to come up after seven laps. Several pit stops and some laps later on, Brinker had to stop the car and retired, and he was of course very disappointed: “This was not our day, today. Our plans were completely upset by the heat. This is nothing you can be prepared for. Here you can see again how close success and defeat are together. Apart from this, the car is running very well. I am very happy with the performance of the car, in particular with the new engine. I hope we will have more luck next time.”
The crew in the second iron in the fire of the Ring-Racing team, the Clio driven by Engel & Bengel, would also have wished to be more lucky. Some minutes after the out of Karl Brinker, they, too, had to retire with their Renault. This time, it was not a mechanical failure but an accident which occurred during the battle within the class and after which the two drivers from Cologne had top stop the race.
So all of the attention was then concentrated onto the Ring-Racing Clio of Jean-Jacques Meyer. He, too, was however affected by some trouble. After some close battles, Meyer had to learn how to drive his French race car without front spoiler. Nevertheless, Meyer took it easy and finished the race until the advanced stopping of the race due to the accident of Hans-Joachim Stuck. Despite the relatively long stop for repair, solo driver Meyer finished the race into twelfth place in the special Renault classification. An absolutely masterly performance considering the cockpit temperatures of more than sixty degrees Celsius.
Ring-Racing will use the time up to the next VLN round intensively to inspect in detail the current stage of the engine development of the Brinker-Clio. The team is extremely satisfied with the low wear of the engine.
At the next VLN race, Ring-Racing will again start with three cars, hoping to then collect some cups again at the big VLN summer party. It’ll be exciting to see.
