GT1 World, Slovakia Ring II - Qualifying Race Report

Yelmer Buurman and Michael Bartels won at the Slovakia Ring again. After winning the Championship Race back in June, the German-Dutch pairing won the Qualifying Race this afternoon. Team mates Niki Mayr-Melnhof and Mathias Lauda finished second.

The Vita4One Racing Team BMW of Buurman and Bartels had dominated so far and started the race from pole position. Bartels maintained that lead at the start and kept the All-Inkl.com Mercedes of Markus Winkelhock behind him. Oliver Jarvis managed to move into fourth place, but then suffered a puncture on his Belgian Audi Club Team WRT Audi R8 LMS ultra and was forced to retire.

A strong first stint for Michael Bartels meant the BMW Z4 GT3 was still in the lead when the pit window opened. Bartels and Winkelhock pitted at the same time, both teams executed a perfect pit stop and as a result Buurman rejoined ahead of Basseng. The second Vita4One Racing Team BMW stayed out until the end of the pit window, but then lost time when Mayr-Melnhof was unable to restart the car immediately. This allowed the second Mercedes of Nicky Pastorelli to move into third place. Further down the pit the WRT Audi team also lost time, resulting in Ortelli losing fifth position.

After the stops Mayr-Melnhof launched his attack on Pastorelli and when Pastorelli ran just a bit wide on lap 18 the BMW-driver moved up into third place. As Buurman pulled away at the front Mayr-Melnhof closed in on Basseng and five laps after taking third place the Austrian passed Basseng into turn 2.

In the remaining laps Mayr-Melnhof closed the gap to Buurman but he was unable to catch and overtake his teammate. After 29 laps Buurman crossed the line to take the chequered flag, just over three seconds clear of his teammate.

Basseng clinched third, just one second ahead of Pastorelli and a charging Ortelli. Peter Kox finished in sixth place, ten seconds behind the top five. Hexis Racing only finished eighth and ninth, scoring no points for the championship.