Nurburgring Endurance Championship: Round 3 Race Review

Prologue

With the lunch-break over, the spectators returned to the fences, teams returned to the garages, and drivers suited and booted themselves for qualifying.

Qualifying

In GT4 class - Truswell was trying to spice up his season after two consecutive 4th place finishes - would it be third time lucky today? Truswell's prior qualifying results were two 6th-places in a row, putting in:

8:49.527 (R2)

9:41.730 (R1) Could he keep up the trend?

It wouldn't be pole. Pole would be a 8:35.499 to beat - the quickest pole had been all season.

It would be 8th for Truswell - 4th row - the competition would be tough, but it would mean more points at the end of the day if Truswell could pull off a good result.

The Race

It was an absolutely stellar start for Truswell - despite dropping to the back of the 11-strong field at the start, Truswell would gain 2 positions in the opening lap. The driver starting in P2 had an absolute nightmare of a race, first spinning at T1, dropping to the back of the field, before being completely wiped out by a recovering Porsche 911 Cup whom tried an ambitious move down the inside at Wehrseifen - causing the GT4 to retire. Later that same lap, another driver ALSO came into "confidence issues" - misjudging the aptly named "Confidence Curve" and understeering into the barrier on the exit - but luckily (for him) escaped with damage.

With a 4-second gap ahead to 8th - Truswell had it all to do.

Whilst Truswell stayed put, the gap did slowly decrease to to 3 seconds the following lap.

On Lap 3, the BMW ahead pitted - promoting Truswell up into 8th - the Armco Adventure for the BMW ahead - not turning out to be the fastest strategy.

Drama struck the following lap (Lap 4) as the 6th place Mercedes pulled over at the side of the track at Karussell and returned to the pits - the issue still unknown.

On Lap 5, Truswell was promoted up to 7th with the Merc's Mystery issue. With a comfortable 24-second gap to the car ahead, and equally comfortable 12 second gap to the car behind, Truswell truly was in no-man's-land heading into the first Pit-Window

On Lap 6, this increased to 31 seconds ahead - and the next car 8 seconds behind - quickly closing in on the Brit.

Just as the pit-window opened, the GT4 pack erupted into drama -P2 losing the back end at the exit of Metzgesfeld/entry to Kallenhard and hitting the wall - P3 & P4 in the thick of a tight battle both being promoted up to P2 & P3 respectably.

At the end of the lap, only the leader, BMW in P2 and Merc in P4 stay out in addition to the Merc in 6th and Truswell currently in 7th.

The remaining GT4's pit on Lap 7.

With the first round of pit-stops sorted:

The pole-sitter Overme Esports retains a comfortable lead.

Despite their brush with the barrier earlier, SOY Motorsport Team re-collect 2nd. Newpack Racing retains 3rd. Rochy Racing team is promoted up into 4th.

Hauptsache Ankommen makes a good recovery to 5th.

TMS Central Racing leave the pits in 6th, but drops to 7th after a small mistake on the exit of Karrussell - exactly where they were before they pitted.

This mistake is taken by Franz Hermann x Bed Rull Racing - who are promoted up to 6th. LS Performance round up the rear in 8th - 9th being Henze Racing.

On Lap 9, Truswell would take back 6th from Franz Hermann ' Racing with almost an hour and a half gone.

Next up was to challenge the Top 5! With an 18-second gap ahead, Truswell just had to keep it consistent - and try and close - or maintain the gap.

On Lap 10 - the race took another interesting turn - Rochy Racing (P4) pitted after going just a little too wide at Schwalbenschwanz (Swallow Tail) - causing enough damage to sadly retire the car. This in turn, promoted me up into 5th, before P4 ahead pitted on Lap 11, further promoted me up into 4th.

Although it would only last a lap as LS-Performance behind would spend the lap reeling me in before managing to pass me on the Dottinghoe.

And just like that we were at the second pit-window - Lap 14 and half-way into the race. -- Pit-stop cycle completed - OVERME Esports held their lead over

SOY Motorsport Team in Second.

34 seconds behind, the Newpack Racing BMW was hunting down the leaders with a 2-minute advantage over new-P4 LS-Performance whom just passed Truswell and TMS Central Racing for 4th. Truswell sat (recently overtaken) in 5th, the Franz Hermann squad closing in behind in 6th.

In 8th it was Henze Racing, -2 Laps down after a very difficult day. Followed far behind by MHV Motorsport "Fighting Pumpkins" - emerging out of the pits on Lap 20, having only completed 5 laps themselves - truly a day to forget. With an hour to go, the GT4 standings looked as follows:

1st - Overme Esports

2nd - SOU Motorsport Team 3rd - Newpack Racing 4th - LS Performance 5th - TMS Central Racing 6th - Franz Hermann X Bed Rull Racing 7th - Hauptsache Ankommen - 1 Lap

8th - Henze Racing Team -2 Laps 9th - MHV Motorsport "Fighting Pumpkins -13 Laps (End in DSQ) 10th - Rochy Racing Team - DNF 11th - The Sinormall Clube - DNF And they would finish in this order.

Truswell would score +51 points for 5th, unfortunately his smallest points-haul of the year.

So, what does that mean in terms of the Division 6 Championship Standings?

Nurburgring Endurance Challenge - GT4 Standings - Division 6

The Top 3 stay as they are, Burroghs and Kresz both gain positions - as does Truswell whom jumps from 11th to 7th - just 2 points off 6th - a good result next time out should make that into a very interesting championship fight. The next race is in July.