24H Spa: Great premiere for Ricardo Feller 🎥
NOT JUST NICO MÜLLER The 24 Hours of Spa, the biggest GT3 race, takes place this weekend. Among the Swiss favorites is not only Nico Müller, but also the young Ricardo Feller. With 72 GT3 sports cars passing technical scrutineering, the 24 Hours of Spa is the most important and largest endurance race in this category, [...]
With 72 GT3 sports cars passing technical scrutineering, the 24 Hours of Spa is the most important and largest endurance race in this category, comparable to Le Mans for sports prototypes. A victory counts more here than elsewhere, as the 24 Hours of Nürburgring appeals more to the specialists and many points towards the Blancpain GT Series and Intercontinental GT Challenge are at stake in Belgium.
How good is the Audi rating?
Nico Müller has already won the Eifel Marathon once in 2015. However, after second and third places, he is still missing a victory in Spa.
With an Audi R8 of the multiple winning team WRT from Belgium and René Rast and Robin Frijns as teammates (one leads the 2019 DTM standings ahead of him, the other drives with him in Audi Team Abt Sportsline), the Bernese driver would have optimum prerequisites. The only question is how the R8s will be classified by the Balance of Performance.
Nico Müller: "We are a great team. But I only see a chance for us if the BoP is right. We looked rather weak on the test day. Although we were the fastest Audi, we were far behind in terms of times. So we'll see. It's going to be a battle..."
Jeffrey Schmidt is succeeded by Ricardo Feller
Team Montaplast by Land Motorsport, where Ricardo Feller is another Swiss driver in an Audi R8, is also hoping for balance. The German flounders were already slightly outgunned last year, but the professional German private team managed to finish on the podium in third place behind two BMW M6s thanks to speed and clever strategy. Among the lucky ones was Jeffrey Schmidt, for whom this represents the greatest success to date.
For 2019, Land Motorsport has reconfigured the pairing for Spa with Christopher Mies (D), Ricardo Feller and Jamie Green (GB). Feller also drives for Land in the ADAC GT Masters and with Mies in American endurance races. Green, who is familiar from the DM, replaces the scheduled ex-WTCC champion José Maria Lopez, who felt underprepared with only one test at Spa. Which shows what is expected of the drivers - namely a top performance.
This is only right for the 19-year-old from Aargau for his premiere in the Battle of the Bulge.
Ricardo Feller: "I am overjoyed to be competing with Land. We feel that we are in a top position. But no matter how good the conditions are for a race like this, they're no use if you don't also have the necessary luck that you simply need to succeed."
For Feller, this is the most significant race entry ever, although he already competed in the Dubai 24 Hours and Daytona in January.
Ricardo Feller: "At no other race is the level as high as at Spa. Everything that's anyone's business in GT3 is here. That's why the team also makes very high demands on itself and us drivers. But I'm looking forward to this challenge and want to deliver a flawless performance."
St. Gallen with three Aston Martin
Other Swiss drivers with ambitions of overall victory or at least a podium are Rolf Ineichen in a Lamborghini Huracan from GRT Grasser Racing (who has never won the 24 Hours of Spa), Alexandre Imperatori in a Nissan GT-R Nismo, and the R-Motorsport team from St. Gallen with its three Aston Martin Vantage cars, which operates in British cooperation with Arden and Jota. One of the nine drivers is Lausanne's Hugo de Sadeleer, whose car is running in the Silver Cup (for Silver-rated drivers).
Other Swiss competitors in this category include Philipp Frommenwiler on Honda NSX and Lucas Mauron on a GRT Lamborghini. For health reasons (neck pain under stress as a late consequence of an accident in the TCR 2017), Kris Richard, on the other hand, unfortunately has to pass.
Ambitions for the class win
In the Pro-Am for teams mixed with gold, silver and bronze drivers, Roberto Pampanini, Mauro Calamia, Stefano Monaco and Ivan Jacoma (unfaithful to Porsche for once) form an Italo-Swiss team on a Mercedes-AMG. Daniel Allemann and Mathias Beche also have class podium ambitions on two different Porsches.
Finally, in the Am Cup for bronze drivers, Adrian Amstutz wants to repeat last year's victory. In doing so, the Lucerne native also laid the foundation for his subsequent title win in the Blancpain Endurance Cup.
Completely live on the Internet
The complete race with start on Saturday at 4.30 p.m. can be watched in the livestream at https://www.total24hours.com/watch-live on the page of the organizer, under https://www.blancpain-gt-series.com/watch-live of the series organizer or on their channels on Facebook and Youtube. Eurosport 1 and 2 will report on it in phases on television.
AutoSprintCH also offers a live ticker with information and pictures on its homepage.
