Nurburgring 24 Hours - Wrap-Up

What an extraordinary end to an extraordinary race.

Half a decade of success by Manthey Racing punctuated this year with a record that says 'not classified' courtesy of a car that wasn't quite fast enough, not quite economical enough and not quite robust enough to give Olaf Manthey the breadth he needed to weave his usual brand of strategic magic.

As finishes go to International sportscar races there are few to rival it - but there was a dark and worrying edge.

Firstly though let's remember that Audi finally won a race they'd been trying to add to their trophy cabinet for years, and they did it in a manner which will have been tough to take for their main rivals after the likelihood of doing so seemed repeatedly to be grabbed away from them over the course of as closely fought a 24 hour race as the Nurburgring has ever seen.

After Spa and Zolder last year this was the third 24 Hour race win for the R8 LMS and the first for the revised 2012 Ultra.

The Aston Martin and Corvette programmes were welcome diversions (albeit in competitive terms not for long) from the local norm - Here's hoping both marques come back for more - and bring friends!

Mercedes Benz fell short again with bad luck (punctures) and suspect reliability, the SLS has yet to fulfil anything like the potential envisaged for it by either its designers, or indeed by some of it's customers.

The BMWs again had speed but again found trouble with all of the SP9 cars seemingly suffering from brake issues and/ or cooling issues. The Z4M GT3 programme is another that needs to find an Omega Code.

As suggested above, the reality is that Porsches were probably even further away.  Was that a mark of the lack of frontline factory involvement, or is the pace of development leaving the 997 GT3R struggling?

The new R8 LMS Ultra is a step forward in the areas where it was needed - the Audi might have lacked the ultimate straight line speed of the AMG but it's handling, stopping power, and critically it's reliability we're the class of the core field.

As for the record books they will record that Audi took their first win, Phoenix their third.

Markus Winkelhock adds a win to the family trophy cabinet alongside his uncle's pair. 

Frank Stippler, Christopher Haase and Marc Basseng are first time names engraved on the trophy too.

As for that finish:

On an emotional level it was frankly thrilling, the emerging layers would have been dismissed as a hack novella if written as fiction, a fighting finish for fourth and pride looked to be more than enough to cap an engaging race weekend.

That script changed though as the #65 Hankook Heico Mercedes in-car pictures showed its run was doomed to failure with 20 minutes to go!  Cruel, cruel luck. 

The message clearly got through to the battling pair behind that the fight was now for a podium slot, the pace of the chase took them by the cruising race leader to get back on the lead lap - from there on in though the endeavour was doomed, even as Porsche and Benz diced through cars forming up for the finish.

We'll probably never really know exactly who said what in the Manthey camp that led to Romain Dumas stopping as the duelling pair started what should have been their final lap.

Some reports suggest the Porsche's engine may have failed, others that Dumas was told to stop before the line to avoid having to go around again, but too late to prevent the car just crossing the line, 8 seconds before the race time was up, that already put the car in an unclassified position but far worse though was what happened seconds later as a 'walking wounded' privateer in a Renault Clio that was too busy watching the flag and/ or his pit crew to notice the Porsche on the far left hand side of the track hit the rear of the Porsche without braking – The impact left both cars badly damaged but mercifully neither driver was badly hurt.

There will, no doubt, be regulation changes to reduce the chances of a repeat of the incident, and it would be incorrect to attempt to attribute blame, what a shame that such a good close race had to end on such a note, and what a shame that Manthey’s reign, for now at least, was punctuated is such a fashion.

The race overall was a cracker, though it still needs a manufacturer from outside Germany to step up and challenge – All the signs are that one intends to do just that – With the strength in depth we saw from the home teams it most likely will need to be a multi year programme to have a hope of success – We’re game if they are!

GG