Big celebrations in the team Lubner Event & Motorsport. With their second place in the Opel Astra OPC Cup class, Thorsten Wolter (Berlin), Heinz-Otto and Jürgen Fritzsche (both from Hückeswagen/ Germany) scored full points in the Cup classification at the fourth round of the VLN endurance racing championship Nürburgring. The experienced driver trio – the Fritzsche brothers together have won not less than five VLN titles – thus also went into the lead of the championship classification. After 2:36:17,278 hours race time, Hannu Luostarinen (Adenau/ Germany) and Tim Schrick (Munich) took the chequered flag as winners of the 45th Adenauer ADAC Simfy Trophy. The race which was originally scheduled to run over four hours was stopped after an accident of two cars in other classes and not restarted.
“We are more than happy”, said Heinz-Otto Fritzsche. “Our team had to work really hard to get the car ready for today’s start after our accident at the second round. They have prepared a perfect car – and we can express our gratitude and thanks now with the second place in the championship classification.” Wolter added: “Out triumph today was due to the great experience which comes together in the cockpit in the combination of all our drivers. On the one hand you always have to get used to a new car first of all. On the other hand it was important to realize that we do not have to go maximum attack in order to score maximum points.”
Even though the winners are not eligible to score points in the Astra OPC Cup, the class win is a reason to celebrate for the German-Finnish driver duo. “The race was really great fun again”, said TV moderator Schrick. “We had a perfect setup, especially considering the long distance. As a team, we furthermore work in perfect harmony.” Luostarinen sees the reason for their success in particular in the economic way of driving. “Once filled up, we manage to complete one more lap compared to our competitors”, he said and added with a smile in his face: “I cannot really tell the reason.”
Behind the top two, Jari Nuoramo, Juha Hannonen (both from Finland) and Ralf-Peter Bonk (Senden/ Germany) finished third in the Astra of the team PB Per4mance. “We can be happy with our third place”, said Bonk. “We have made a good step forwards and into the right direction regarding the setup of our car and we were able to apply that in today’s race.” Nuoramo in particular demonstrated his clever prudence in the field which comprised more than 200 cars: “We were obviously faster than our rivals today, but we couldn’t find a way around them. So third position is ok.”
With 87 points, the Lubner team has now gone into the lead of the championship classification, ahead of the team PB Per4mance with a score of 76 points. Last year’s champions Mario Merten (Kelberg/ Germany) and Jürgen Nett (Mayen/ Germany), who are competing for the team of Bonk Motorsport, had to come to an unscheduled pit stop after 14 laps as a screw on the turbo charger had become loose. The driver duo was shown in 13th class position at the moment the race was stopped. They thus did not only loose valuable points but also the lead in the championship.
For a number of Opel Astra OPC Cup teams, their calendar includes the Nürburgring ADAC Zurich 24h Race to take place between 19 and 22 June 2014. This highlight of the season at the Eifel track is however not a qualifying round for the Cup. The fifth VLN round will take place on 5th July 2014. The 54th ADAC Reinoldus-Langstreckenrennen will run over the usual four hours race time.
