Tom Coronel celebrates debuts in ZAKSPEED NissanNissan GT-R NISMO GT3 retires in VLN race
Team ZAKSPEED experienced an eventful weekend with the Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 at the VLN round at Nordschleife. At half-time of the home race for the team based in Niederzissen, the #24 Nissan GT-R retired with a technical failure.
Following its successful debut at the qualification race for the 24h-race at Nürburgring two weeks ago, the VLN race was an important step in the development stages towards the endurance race in May. But the problems already started in Qualifying on Saturday morning, with the Nissan GT-R being involved in a collision. The car suffered severe damage and was unable to set a timed lap.
The team showed a great achievement and managed to put the repaired Nissan in the starting grid on time. Tom Coronel, who had his first race for ZAKSPEED in the Japanese racing car, started into the race from the back of the first starting group, being able to attack right from the beginning. The track had dried-up after the first lap and Coronel pitted to change to slick tyres. Until his pit-stop, Coronel was already running in P27 when he handed the car over to team-mate Marc Gassner.
Unfortunately, a technical problem stopped Gassner and he was forced to retire the Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 in the area around Kesselchen.
Driver Quotes
Tom Coronel:"It was difficult to get a free lap and the track conditions also changed all the time. We did not take any risk and had everything under control in my stint. But some cars went wild and there were some heavy accidents. Our Nissan is a strong car and is able to set consistent lap times. We have to work on the Set-up a little, but I am confident that we will have a good car for the 24h-race.”
Florian Strauss:"The weekend was disappointing for us. We already suffered problems during qualifying with the incident on the entry to the Nordschleife and damaged the car. We were able to repair the damage and Tom (Coronel) had a good start making some great progress throughout. But then the Nissan GT-R had to be stopped due to some technical issues. It is unfortunate, because we should have used the time to collect more information for the 24h-race.”
Marc Gassner:"The car felt normal and I had no warning that something would go wrong. Suddenly there was smoke in the car and I stopped the car. Since we are still in the developing stages, we have to go and analyse now what happened. It is a shame for the entire team, but we are now hoping for a better race at the third VLN round.”
