ANOTHER 24 HOURS, ANOTHER PODIUM FINISH
ProSpeed Competition Scores Third Consecutive 24-Hour Podium; Leads Race For 5 Hours
ProSpeed Competition scored its third podium finish in three consecutive 24-hour races.
After overall and class podium finishes in Dubai and Spa, the Liège team added another string to their endurance bow by finishing third overall and second in the GT3 class in Sunday’s 29th running of the Zolder 24 Hours, the first ever 24-hour race where GT3 cars are the lead players. Rudi Penders, Franz Lamot, Kurt Dujardyn and Jos Van Roij ran inside the top 6 for most of the race, gradually making up places during the long September night. Today’s result marks the team’s best finish of their 2007 Belcar season.
The team’s other car, the #52 Porsche 997 GT3 Cup crewed by Fred Bouvy, David Loix, François Duval and Armand Fumal had led the better part of the first five hours of racing until they were hit by a clutch failure which cost them 26 laps in repairs. Throughout the night, ProSpeed Competition’s fearsome foursome clawed their way back to the top and ran again in eighth overall when the gearbox failed after 16 hours of racing, putting an end to their valiant efforts. “The first five hours the car ran like clockwork,” a disappointed Fred Bouvy said. “The fight for the lead was tough but fair, and the car handled brilliantly. Then the clutch went and with it our chances for a win, which was what we had set our sights on.”
All four drivers then started a hard chase through the night, in which at one point rally ace, François Duval, couldn’t believe his eyes when he was closely following the championship leading Corvette. “We had been running in tandem for a few laps,” Duval said. “Then the back of the Corvette started burning but apparently without the driver noticing. So I started flashing my high beams like mad, and fortunately the driver realized than I wasn’t about to pass him so something else had to be wrong. He then pulled over at a marshal’s post when the car really started burning.”
While at the front some of the leaders started having troubles, Penders and co homed in on the overall podium. “Everything worked brilliantly,” Penders said. “The car ran very consistently and predictably right until the end, although the last 40 minutes or so my brakes went AWOL which meant I had to guess and gamble at corners from time to time. Shifting down to fourth also proved increasingly difficult, so although we finished just nine seconds from second place overall it would have been very risky to tempt anything to grab that position. The whole team also lived up to my expectations, and cued all the pitstops just right, working with the safety cars and so on. It has been a difficult season so far, but finishing on the podium today makes up for a lot.”
The team’s next 24-hour race will again be the Dubai 24 Hours in January 2008. The next international outing is the FIA GT Championship finale in October, also at Zolder.
ZOLDER 24 HOURS RACE RESULTS
1. Dumarey/Dumarey/Soulet/Goossens Porsche 997 GT3 Cup (1st GT3) 798 laps2. Vanierschot/Steegmans/Bruynooghe/Schreurs Porsche 996 Biturbo (1st Cl.3) + 12 laps3. Penders/Lamot/Dujardyn/Van Roij Porsche 997 GT3 Cup (2nd GT3) + 12 laps4. Heylen/Vanthoor/Wauters/Wauters Dodge Viper Comp Coupe (3rd GT3) + 16 laps5. Neyens/Heinz/Colman/Cauwberghs Porsche 996 GT3 Cup (1st Cl.2) + 19 laps6. Hahn/Hillebrand/Palttalla/Van Sande Porsche 997 GT3 Cup + 26 laps7. Vosse/Lefort/Kelders/Lambert Mosler MT900 GT3 + 47 laps8. Nelissen Grade/Van Uytsel/Beliën/De Vrie Porsche 996 GT3 Cup (2nd Cl.2) + 51 laps9. Jeuris/Vetters/Van Rompuy/Van Rompuy Porsche 996 GT3 Cup (3rd Cl.3) + 58 laps10. Broodcoren/De Coster/Goffin/Bouillon Porsche 996 GT3 Cup + 69 lapsDNF Bouvy/Loix/Duval/Fumal Porsche 997 GT3 Cup Gearbox
