24H Portimão: Autorama on top again 🎥
TCR WIN IN PORTUGAL In the first real race in Europe since the Corona crisis, Autorama Motorsport secured class victory at the 24 Hours of Portimão. Two of the five drivers were Miklas Born and Yannick Mettler. As in the previous year, Autorama Motorsport by Wolf-Power prevailed in the TCR class, which included six competitors. At the wheel, the [...]
As in the previous year, Autorama Motorsport by Wolf-Power prevailed in the TCR class, which comprised six competitors. At the wheel, Miklas Born from Basel and Yannick Mettler from Lucerne took turns with the Finns Antti Buri and Kari-Pekka Laaksonen and the Italian Roberto Ferri.
The number 112 VW Golf GTI TCR was one of a total of four TCR cars that took turns in the lead during the course of the 24-hour race. The first European car race since the outbreak of the Corona pandemic took place under the highest security conditions and to the exclusion of the public.
Pursuer penalized retroactively
In the second half of the race, the Swiss team's lead was never much more than a lap. Finally, defending champion Yannick Mettler, who was already a member of the winning team last year, crossed the finish line almost two and a half minutes ahead of the runners-up after 663 laps.
However, the Belgian Audi team subsequently received a deduction of nine laps for exceeding the maximum driving time of pro Tom Coronel. So the advantage in the end was the equivalent of more than 20 minutes or ten laps.
Technical bad luck for the second Autorama team
After 3rd place in the 24H Dubai in January, this meant the first win of the season for the Wolf-Power Racing-backed team from Wetzikon and, for junior Miklas Born, who comes from karting, the first ever in motor racing. Born also turned the fastest lap of the Autorama drivers on Sunday morning.
The second Golf with the all-Swiss crew of Jasmin Preisig, Jérôme Ogay, Christoph Lenz, team boss Stefan Tanner and double starter Mettler also had the best prospects of winning the class until deep into the night. However, a broken fuel injector and a gearbox change in the pits cost a lot of time. As a result, the team ultimately had to settle for 5th place in class and 10th overall.
Double victory for Herberth-Porsche
Overall victory at the fourth edition of the Hankook 24H Portimão went to the East German team Herberth Motorsport with its two Porsche 991 GT3 R cars. Tim Müller, Taki Konstantinou, Jürgen Häring, Michael Joos and Marco Seefried improved the distance record at this race in the Algarve with their winning drive. The previous record was 722 laps, set in 2017 by the Ferrari team from the Czech Republic, which also won in 2019. The new record is 731 laps.
The sister car with Daniel Allemann from Solothurn and the Germans Ralf Bohn, Robert Renauer and Alfred Renauer lost more than an hour in the pits due to a gearbox change. Back in the race action, the Porsche with Robert Renauer at the wheel set the fastest race lap in the race to catch up.
Pole setter accident
The Mercedes-AMG GT3 of HTP Winward Motorsport, which started from pole position and was driven by Philip Ellis from Zug, was already out of the race after only three hours due to a violent impact into the crash barriers. Bryce Ward was able to emerge from the GT3 sports car unscathed, but the damage was irreparable on the spot.
Premiere in Monza
Only eleven of the 15 teams finished. The next endurance race of the 24H SERIES powered by Hankook will be held for the first time at the Autodromo Nazionale di Monza on July 10 and 11. Then, thanks to the national borders being open again in Europe, significantly more teams are expected at the start.
Overall classification 24 Hours of Portimao
