The race debut of the new BMW M6 GT3 for ROWE RACING at the season-opener in the VLN Endurance Championship at the Nürburgring became a test under race conditions. After almost all testing was cancelled on Friday, due to a very late return of winter weather to the Eifel region, the team from St. Ingbert used the 62^nd ADAC Westfalenfahrt primarily to gather data and experience with the two cars from new partner BMW Motorsport. The restricted testing meant that race results were less important than preparations for the highlight of the season on 28^th/29^th May, when the 24-hour race will take place at the Nürburgring for the 44^th time.

The potential of the BMW M6 GT3 was clear to see in the early stages of this first of ten VLN races. In car #23, shared by BMW DTM driver Maxime Martin from Belgium and the Austrian Philipp Eng, the German BMW works driver Dirk Werner moved his way up from a starting position of 16^th to fifth in the first five laps. However, technical problems after the tenth lap meant that a long break was required for repairs. The vehicle returned to the race to chalk up some more valuable kilometres.

In the second #22 ROWE RACING car, driven by Germany’s Klaus Graf and his new team-mates Richard Westbrook of Great Britain and Finland’s Markus Palttala, the team used the four-hour race to work on various fine-tuning options for the vehicle. The final placing for this trio was 17^th.

ROWE RACING team principal Hans-Peter Naundorf: “We are happy to have got some race kilometres under our belts with the new cars. The first impressions are positive and the new BMW M6 GT3 gives us a good base to work from. There are a few topics specific to the Nordschleife, which we have to work on. After the bad weather of the last few weeks, we started to work on these areas today and we can now sit down and evaluate the data.”

The week by week rhythm of the new season now continues for ROWE RACING. Next weekend (8^th-10^th April), the Blancpain Sprint Series will start in Misano, Italy. In two weeks‘ time (17^th April), it’s back to the Nürburgring for the qualifying competition for the 24-hour race.