With the tenth race in the VLN endurance racing championship, the race drivers now say goodbye and will start into the winter break. However, before proceeding so, the teams and drivers would not miss to once again present motorsport at its best at the track of the Nürburgring Nordschleife in mild autumn temperatures. The teams supported by the Porsche Zentrum Willich did of course not miss this opportunity – and finished with quite different results.
Sabine Schmitz and Klaus Abbelen finished the race into tenth position in class SP 9 with their Porsche 997 GT3 R. They were shown 56th in the overall classification. Compared to the position on the podium two weeks ago, this seemed to be rather a disappointing result but it was caused by a broken drive shaft in the third race lap. The team was ready to retire from the race but the two drivers did not agree.
As the fans of the “quickest ‘Frikadelle’ on the world” is not only huge but they also identify themselves highly with the team and with the car, the driver duo Schmitz/ Abbelen did not want to disappoint their fans. They rejoined the race after a repair time of about 30 minutes. The Porsche had of course lost many positions but the team was fully rewarded by the fans.
The situation in the team of PROsport Ferformance was quite different. The close-to-production Porsche Cayman again had a fast race and finished fifth in class V6. Thomas Koll, Heinz-Josef „Juppi“ Bermes and Helmut Weber were enthusiastic about the performance and the set-up of their car. “We now have to carry on working on the car during winter as the competitors will not take a rest either”, said PZ Managing Director Joachim Tünnesen. Even though the modifications permitted on the cars in this class are very restricted, there is always something to improve.
“All together, I am very happy with the motor sport season”, informed Tünnesen. He intents to carry on the motor sports engagement of the Porsche Zentrum. Negotiations during the next weeks will decide how exactly this will look like, there is anyhow plenty of time until the start of the new season. The VLN endurance racing championship will start the year 2012 with the first race not before end of March.
