At the 52nd ADAC Reinoldus Langstreckenrennen, a round of the VLN endurance racing championship, the Hamburg Racing Team achieved another class win in the very competitive class SP10 for GT4 cars. The drivers Kim Andre Hauschild, Karl Pflanz and Thomas Kappeler succeeded for the second time in the current VLN endurance racing championship season in finishing on the podium. With their 3rd class position (25th overall), they equalized their so far best result in the current season, achieved at the 2nd round when the private Aston racing team also finished third at the DMV 4h Race mid April. The participation of the team from North Germany in class SP8 for high-capacity series competition cars in contrast found an early end after retirement. The Gmaxx Corvette which was for the first time serviced by the Hamburg Racing Team and driven by Ed Nicelife, Kim Andre Hauschild und Thomas Gerling had to stop the race after 7 laps due to problems in the drive system.
The team finished the timed practice in overall places 39 (SP8: position 2) with the Corvette and 47 (SP 10: position 5) with the Aston Martin. After a turbulent start of the race when several top teams were involved in an accident at the Fuchsröhre, Vantage start driver Kim Andre Hauschild was able to move up very quickly and went into the lead of is class at the end of his stint. “4 cars were involved in the accident at the Fuchsröhre and it was quite difficult to make your way through. Afterwards, I was able to gain a few places and moved up into the lead of our class. Unfortunately, I then hit the guardrails and we had to repair the mudguard at my stop. Looking back, this might have spoiled an even better result for our team.”
Due to the longer pit stop the team dropped back into third class position behind the competitors of Mathol and Walkenhorst Racing but Hauschild’s team mates Karl Pflanz and Thomas Kappeler were anyhow able to keep this position until the finish. “I even spun in my stint but was able to rejoin the race without hitting anything. Apart from that, everything was running perfectly”, explained Pflanz at the end of the race.
The team from Hamburg was furthermore looking after a Corvette in class SP8 driven by “Ed Nicelife”. The German privateer had already competed in Dubai in an Aston Martin of the same team and now used the team infrastructure to participate with his series Corvette for the first time this year in the VLN series. “Last year, I lost my co-drivers unfortunately, so I had to do some races as solo driver. But that is not really great fun. With HRT I have now a racing team and some co-drivers again which made our come back here more easy,” explained Nicelife who moved up into 20th position (amongst 152 starters) with the 6 litre race car until his first pit stop. Unfortunately, the team, holding 2nd class position, was then stopped by a damage in the drive system. “Originally, we thought the gearbox sensor had broken but after having changed the part we realized that probably the differential was damaged, too. It’s a pity as I set fastest time in the Corvette this morning in qualifying “, said Hauschild who, just as the 3rd Corvette driver Thomas Gerling, did thus not have the chance to drive in the race.
“It’s too bad that the Corvette retired because we missed a class win as the Ferrari which was in front of us also encountered big difficulties towards the end and had to retire, too,” said team manager Michael Budde regretfully. “But anyhow, we finished on the podium again at least in class SP10 with our Aston. We could have scored an even better result without the small mistakes. However, the drivers and the team have done a brilliant job and the development for our team is in any case going upwards.”
