36th ADAC Zurich 24h Race : Manthey completes the hat-trick

The 36th ADAC Zurich 24h Race at the Nürburgring reached its denouement with a third consecutive overall victory for team boss Olaf Manthey to add to his wins in 2006 and 2007. After 148 laps (3,755.94 km) of racing, the driver line-up of Timo Bernhard / Marc Lieb / Romain Dumas / Marcel Tiemann (Germany / Germany / Switzerland / Monaco) brought their Porsche 911 GT3-RSR home in style in front of 220,000 fans lining the 25.378-km circuit. It was a perfect weekend for former DTM driver Manthey, as his second car piloted by Armin Hahne / Christian Haarmann / Jochen Krumbach / Pierre Kaffer (Monaco / Germany / Germany / Switzerland) came home in second place. This was the Porsche 911 GT3-MR that won the 2006 edition of the race for Manthey. Third position in what was, at times, a dramatic race went to the two-times Nürburgring 24h winner Sabine Schmitz and her German team-mates Klaus Abbelen, Dr Edgar Althoff and Kenneth Heyer in their Porsche 997. The lead changed hands seventeen times over the course of the marathon Eifel race, with seven different teams getting a taste of life at the head of the field.

“This hat-trick of victories is the crowning glory of my career as a team boss,” beamed Olaf Manthey after his cars completed their one-two finish. However, their success was only achieved after the shock of an early setback. The number 1 Porsche was forced to dive into the pits on the opening lap after its water system developed a fault. This early misfortune served only to inspire a brilliant charge through the field culminating at 3.30 in the morning, when the team finally took over the lead. “We had some minor technical hitches to deal with early on, but apart from that we put together a virtually perfect race,” smiled Manthey. “The guys in the pits and in the cockpit did an excellent job.” His drivers certainly had every reason to celebrate – none more so than Marcel Tiemann, whose fourth victory in the ADAC Zurich 24h Race has elevated him into an elite club of the most successful drivers in the race’s history. “It’s fantastic, a wonderful feeling,” said the adopted Monegasque as he was swept up in the post-race relief. “This fourth win is something very special and puts me up there with the best. It also means I’ve completed a hat-trick with the same team. It’s just great.” There was jubilation too in the pit garage of the “Frikadelli” Porsche squad run by meat products manufacturer Klaus Abbelen. The Porsche 997 team of Abbelen, Dr Edgar Althoff and Sabine Schmitz made it into the top three, with Schmitz – as the only woman on the podium – once again underlining her claim as the most successful female driver in the history of the endurance classic. “The important thing was how consistently we performed over the whole 24 hours,” summed up the local favourite. “This third place is another high point in my career and means a lot to me. The team only came together at the start of the season and has put its heart and soul into the job in hand. I’m tremendously pleased for the whole team.”

Stuck clinches class victory; eye-catching success for Frentzen

There were also a lot of smiling faces in the garage of the Volkswagen works team at the ADAC Zurich 24h Race. Ahead of the market launch of the company’s new Scirocco, motorsport boss Kris Nissen sent the racing version of the fledgling car to prove its mettle in the world’s toughest race. And his decision paid off, the combination of Hans-Joachim Stuck, Thomas Mutsch, Giniel de Villiers and Dieter Depping finishing eleventh in the overall classification and claiming victory in their class. In so doing, the Scirocco came home ahead of its sister car (14th overall), in which three-times 24-hour race winner Stuck joined forces with two-times rally world champion Carlos Sainz. “We gave the Volkswagen Scirocco a really fantastic debut with the class victory,” said Stuck after the race. “It was an extraordinary experience shared with extraordinary team-mates. Putting in a successful performance alongside global stars such as Carlos Sainz in this amazing arena and in the world’s most exacting race gave me huge pleasure.” Heinz-Harald Frentzen, meanwhile, was celebrating an eye-catching success of his own. The ex-Formula One driver showcased the race technology of the future in the shape of the hybrid-drive Apollo racing car. After his team had worked through some technical problems, Frentzen went back out onto the circuit for the final one-and-a-half hours of the race to take his dashing new racer on a lap or two of honour and thank the fans and race organisers for their support. “I would like to thank all our technical partners and team members,” said Frentzen at the finish. “You can look at our result in two ways. On the one hand, we had two lots of problems with the gearbox in the conventional drive system. But, from a different perspective, the brake energy regeneration concept exceeded our expectations.”

[Source : 36th ADAC Zurich 24h Race]