The Haribo Racing Team is happy with their result at the season’s highlight of the VLN endurance racing championship. Uwe Alzen, Marco Holzer and Mike Stursberg finished in an excellent fifth place with their Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 at this VLN race which was the only one in the season to run over a six-hour distance. „Even though I am not on the podium today, I am nevertheless totally happy“, said Uwe Alzen who thus demonstrated the excellent atmosphere prevailing in the team after the race.
Weather conditions were quite difficult in the qualifying. „There was only a very short time window in which the track was dry and in which you had to set your time“, explained Mike Stursberg. The team went out on the track at the right moment and the Haribo gullwing car finished the timed practice in fifth place. As the race was not declared „wet race“, the teams had to take their final tyre choice well ahead. A tyre change on the starting grid was not permitted. „Unfortunately, we took the wrong decision in fitting intermediates“, reported start driver Uwe Alzen. „Conditions were really tricky in the first laps. The teams which started the race with rain tyres had a clear advantage on the wet circuit. They had gained an advantage that we could not equalise in the remaining time of the race.“
When the track conditions improved, Alzen who has a huge experience at the Nordschleife came to the pits after four laps to change to slick tyres. He remained in the car and handed over the steering wheel to Mike Stursberg nine laps later. „The car was perfect“, said the man from Wermelskirchen/ Germany but he was nevertheless upset. „I spun at the Grand Prix Circuit already in my second lap.“ However, the Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 was very competitive and classified in the top ten. After the stint of Marco Holzer, Uwe Alzen went back into the cockpit again and started his final attack.
After 41 laps at the 24.358 kilometres long combination of the Grand-Prix-Circuit short version and the legendary Nordschleife, the black AMG gullwing car took the chequered flag in fifth place. Mission completed: The Haribo Racing Team was able to enjoy crossing the finish line for the first time this year. „The huge efforts of the whole team are finally rewarded“, said Uwe Alzen. „We can build on this result and we are now confident for the next race.“ The team will start again on Saturday, 3rd October, at the last but third VLN race of the season.
