Philipp Leisen (Irrel/ Germany), Carsten Knechtges (Mayen/ Germany) and Alexander Böhm (Kelberg/ Germany) scored a clear class and group victory in class V5 (VLN series production cars with up to 3 litres cubic capacity) at the highlight of the season in the VLN Langstreckenmeisterschaft Nürburgring. The team took the chequered flag after the 6 hours race distance of the 6h Ruhr-Pokal-Rennen with an advance of one lap ahead of the second placed crew. Black Flacon, since two years the most successful team in the popular endurance racing championship, thus assured their lead in the championship classification.
“Our BMW was running without any problems throughout the complete six hours. We could extend our lead over our competitors to more than one lap in the end”, said a happy Carsten Knechtges, who remains also clearly in the lead of the VLN junior classification (driver up to 25 years old), after the finish. With the performance of the Black Falcon-BMW Z4, the team dominated for the third time in a row once again all the more powerful vehicles in the group of VLN standard production cars and could celebrate their group victory after the race together with the overall winners on the podium. The three drivers Böhm, Leisen and Knechtges this time even finished into an excellent 33rd overall position in the race with the total of 182 participants.
Oleg Volin and Evgeniy Vertunov (both from Russia) completed the superb success for Black Falcon in their class with position seven amongst the 14 starters in class V5. “That was a damned fast and hard race today”, said Vertunov. “We were rewarded with 36 laps around the legendary Nordschleife – it is not without reason that the 6h race is the highlight of the season.”
Black Falcon was not that lucky with their other three cars: The frame of the Audi R8 LMS with start number 1, which was improved with great efforts and equipped with a new engine, was so badly damaged in the free practice session on Friday already due to an accident that a repair in the available time was impossible. Maik Rosenberg (Attendorn/ Germany), Emin Akata (Friedrichshafen/ Germany) and Jürgen Dinstühler (Hückeswagen/ Germany) had to retire in their works racer BMW 320i WTCC after 27 laps with a broken exhaust, they were shown on the timing monitors into second class position when they stopped the race. The race for Sean Patrick Breslin, Sean Paul Breslin (both from Ireland) and Bona Ventura (Cologne) in the second Audi R8 LMS was over after an off and a crash into the guardrails in 16th lap. “It is particular bitter to retire at the 6h Race”, admitted Breslin senior. “We stopped for safety reasons as the rear suspension of our Audi was also damaged. I am nevertheless highly motivated for the last third of the season. We will attack again in autumn and work hard till then to achieve a good result.”
The Black Flacon team has eight weeks time now to get ready for the last third of the season. Despite the currently clear lead in the championship, it is still a long and difficult way to secure the title. Due to the classification system in the VLN insofar that at the end of the season only the best eight out of ten race results for each driver are taken into consideration for the classification, there are still two further teams with excellent chances to gain the VLN overall title. A final decision for the championship will therefore probably not be taken before the last round of the season end of October.
The race distance of the 42nd Barbarossapreis on 25th of September will cover the usual distance of four hours, A 30 minute summary of the 6h Ruhr-Pokal-Rennen will be broadcasted in Sport 1 on 7th of August at 10:15hrs.
