The third race of the FIA GT1 World Championship season took place in the Algarve, Portugal last weekend. The weather conditions at the modern 4652m (2.9 miles) long track were perfect for the teams and the pilots.
Having scored points in Zolder, Swiss Racing Team felt confident. The team and pilots Karl Wendlinger (AUT) / Peter Kox (NLD) in the Lamborghini Murcielago LP 670 R-SV #5 and Max Nilsson (SWE) / Jiri Janak (CZE) in car #6 aimed to score again and reach the next qualifying session. They were successful with both: Q2 for Nilsson/Janak, Q3 for Wendlinger/Kox and 10 points for the team. Solely the superiority of the Nissan GT-R which the FIA re-classified in the Balance of Performance prevented the pilots to reach an even better result. There will surely be adjustments to homogenise the field again.
Peter Kox started the qualifying race from P6 and Janak from P14. The Czech was able to reach P11 during his stint before Max Nilsson took over. He drove across the finish line in P12 after showing a good performance. Kox got bad luck. Even though he was able to pass two cars during the start he was rear-ended by Alex Müller (Aston Martin, #7) in the second turn, whereupon he spun and landed at the end of the field. Since he caught up brilliantly and Karl Wendlinger performed perfectly as well they still managed to reach P10.
Before the main race on Sunday Swede Nilsson noticed problems with changing gears on his way to the start-finish. Unfortunately, these problems forced him to park the car in the pit in the second lap. Wendlinger managed a good start and found himself in P7 after the first lap. He was able to keep this place until the driver change. Due to a quick pit stop he gained another place. Kox got back on the track and the Lamborghini performed well and consistently until the end, resulting in P5 and the 10 points mentioned above.
Next weekend, which is only a few days away, the next race of the FIA GT1 World Championship will take place at the Sachsenring circuit in Germany.
Othmar Welti, team principal:
“The weekend had its ups and downs. However, we are pleased with the result, P5 in the championship race. We got a lot of bad luck in the qualifying race but eventually we pushed forward from the end of the field up to tenth place. We make good progress. We lack the speed in the beginning which we will need to work on. Our pit stops were good this weekend and we managed to gain a place with car #5 during the main race. Of course, it is frustrating that we had problems with the gearbox of the other car again but up to that point Max (Nilsson) and Jiri (Janak) were performing well. Both had a really good speed and managed to reach Q2 for the first time. We would wish for them to start scoring as well. In my opinion the FIA’s classification of the Nissan GT-R’s is completely wrong. The cars had already been very competitive and now they just speed off. That is not acceptable and requires corrections.”
Erich Kolb, teammanager:
“The weekend started off with setup work. We were not very happy with the setups during the free practice session and made some modifications for the qualifying. Both cars reached the set targets, Q3 for Murcielago #5 and Q2 for car #6. Peter was hit and spun shortly after the start of the qualifying race. However, he managed to catch up brilliantly with great lap times. Max (Nilsson) had problems with changing gears in the formation lap of Sunday’s race and was forced to park the car in the pit in the second race. Car #5 did great, the lap times were good, the pit stop was good and we finished the race in P5. The weekend proofed that we are on the right track. The FIA’s decision with regard to the Balance of Performance (BoP) of the Nissan’s stood out negatively. It obviously distorted the overall picture this weekend.”
Karl Wendlinger (AUT), #5:
“In general, I am very happy with the weekend, especially with the fifth place in the race today and reaching the third qualifying. We got bad luck in the second turn of the qualifying race when Peter was hit by another car, spun and landed at the end of the field. However, we managed to reach P10 with a consistent performance and good pit stops. I started well in today’s main race. In the third lap I got stuck between two cars but the car is very robust and nothing happened. Then my rear tyres lost their grip a little too early and I was not able to keep up anymore. The team worked perfectly in the pit and we were able to gain a place with Peter getting back on the track in P6. The Sachsenring race next weekend will be a challenge for both the pilots and the car. But I think that we will do great and we definitely want to reach the Top5.”
Peter Kox (NDL), #5:
“We made another step forward. Car #6 reached Q2 and car #5 Q3. After a crash in the qualifying race we managed to reach P10 after landing at the end of the field. You can definitely see a progress. There still is a lot of potential and I love to work with the team and compete for this team. Everybody wants to push forward and that is a lot of fun. The progress is really unbelievable.”
Jiri Janak (CZE), #6 :
“I did not have any problems with the car this weekend. We modified the setup of the car, made progress and I got to know the car a little better. Today the Lamborghini was competitive during the warm-up but unfortunately there were technical problems in the second lap of the race. This track is perfect. I like it a lot now. It was not the case on Friday because the track with its ups and downs and not entirely visible route is difficult and requires the driver to concentrate all the time.”
Source : Swiss Racing Team