After a fantastic 4th overall position at the 6th VLN race and place 14 at the seventh round, the 8th race again was very successful for the Team Car Collection.
After some test laps with the Porsche on Friday, amongst others with the new Porsche 977 GT3 RSR, the team from the Rhine district participated in the timed practice on Saturday morning with three Porsche. The session started at 8:45hrs. Team manager Peter Schmidt who shared the cockpit with Klaus Koch and Ronnie Saurenmann finished in 16th grid position with a time of 8:53.062 minutes taken for the 997 GT3 Cup with start number 66. The team of Dieter Lehner and Marcel Blumer from Switzerland in the 997 GT3 Cup S was completed by the young race driver Christopher Zoechling. The Austrian unfortunately had to stop at the section Hohe Acht due to technical failure. The mechanics immediately arrived on-site and were able to repair the car with start number 5 so that they could complete another lap. With their time of 8:35.931 minutes they finished in 12th position on the grid. The third car of the team, this weekend driven by Bernd Jung, Michael Heimrich and Klaus Hahn, was classified in 26th grid position for the start. The fastest lap time in the Porsche 997 GT3 Cup with start number 85 finally was 9:15.555 minutes.
12 o’clock: The race was started. Marcel Blumer (#5), Peter Schmidt (#66) and Bernd Jung (#58) completed the first turns in the cars of the team Car Collection. All of the three set constant and fast lap times and gained some positions. Jung came to the pits for the first scheduled stop and Michael Heimrich continued. Schmidt came in one lap later and changed to Klaus Koch. Whilst the experienced team carried out the pit stop, Blumer in the third Porsche had also arrived in the pit lane. He was scheduled to come for his stop one lap later but arrived at the pits through the Grand Prix Circuit as he encountered some problems in the car due to a lack of fuel supply. He reacted quicker than some team members and proceeded to the next filling pump. His countryman Dieter Lehner took over the steering wheel. These three drivers, too, completed fast laps and without any problems. In order to avoid the fuel problems in the Cup S race car, it came to the pits first. The final stint was completed by the young Austrian. Again, he set one fastest lap after the next and this despite his lack of experience at the Nordschleife. Ronnie Saurenmann (#66) was one of the final drivers in the team of Car Collection. At the last stop for a change of drivers, Heimrich to be replaced by Hahn, the whole team again worked perfectly. All of the three cars proceeded to a quick splash’n dash towards in the final stage of the race and crossed the finish line into positions 9 (#5), 16 (#66) and 19 (#58). The team was celebrating the success with a big smile in all the faces: “No damage on any of our cars!”
The next and penultimate VLN race of the season will take place on 15th of October.
