Enrico Toccocelo scored his second successive win at the Nurburgring over the weekend to take the Championship lead after his title rival Vitantonio Liuzzi failed to score any points after finishing a delayed 11th.
It was a first ever victory for the Spanish BCN Competicion squad who broke Arden International’s dominant start to the 2004 season in an exciting race that saw overtaking, incidents and many talking points.
Toccacelo had to work hard for his victory by pushing before and after his pit stop to pass early leader Jeffrey Van Hooydonk, as well as passing Robert Doornbos in the second of the Arden entered Lola B2/50’s. “He (Van Hooydonk) was much slower than me and I decided not to take any big risks until after the pit stop,” said Toccacelo after the event. “I then overtook him and after that I controlled the race without taking any risks. It was a perfect victory"
Team principal, Enrique Scalabroni was also delighted with the teams first win and said; “This is the result of hard work. This fight with Arden is so close and they have more experience but we will continue to work non stop".
Liuzzi started from his third pole position of the season but was slow away from the line and lost the lead instantly to a fast starting Van Hooydonk (Coloni Lola). After also losing second to Toccacelo during the first lap, Liuzzi and Tomas Enge (Ma-Con Lola) touched damaging the Arden International drivers car and necessitating an un-scheduled pit stop after also picking up a puncture.
“In the fourth corner Enge hit me. I was on the inside, but I think he didn’t see me,” said Liuzzi. “I think something was bent after the crash, and after two laps the tyre lost pressure, so I had to stop.”
His team boss Christian Horner was equally as frustrated with the accident but took some solace when Liuzzi’s team mate scored his best result of the season by following Toccacelo home in 2nd place. The Dutchman actually re-joined from his pit-stop just ahead of the eventual race winner but had to relinquish the lead to the fired up Italian on lap10. “It was quite difficult to keep the car on the track, because I took some rear wing off at the pit stop,” said Doornbos. “So he passed me. But obviously I’m really happy with second.”
Completing the podium and scoring his best ever F3000 result was Durango’s Yannick Schroeder. The Frenchman capitalized on others misfortune to head a close train of cars at race-end, comprising of the second BCN car of Esteban Guerrieri, Jose Maria Lopez (CMS Lola), Raffaele Giammaria (AEZ Lola), Tomas Enge (Ma-Con Lola) and Jeffrey Van Hooydonk who lost time during his pit-stop but claimed the final point.
Super Nova had a weekend to forget despite early promise shown by Austrian, Patrick Freisacher who climbed from 10th on the grid to 4th in the early running. However, an energetic battle with Enge halted his progress after the two of them collided. “I tried to overtake Enge at corner number three, I was on the inside and he was on the outside, maybe he didn’t see me and he turned in and we collided together and that was the race over.”
Team mate Alan Van Der Merwe was also in the wars with a Ma-Con car but this time it was Enge’s team mate Tony Scmidt. “Unfortunately after I overtook Schmidt, I don’t know if he was frustrated or what but he drove up the back of me,” said the irate ‘Springbok’. It damaged my rear wing and tyre and after that it went from bad to worse.”
The International Formula 3000 teams now take an early summer break before re-convening at Magny Cours on 3rd July for Round
