German Mercedes team Car Collection Motorsport wins first edition of Hankook 12H ZANDVOORT
ZANDVOORT (May 31, 2014) – The first edition of the Hankook 12H ZANDVOORT finished with a fantastic victory for the No. 33 Car Collection Motorsport Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3, driven by Peter Schmidt, Christian Bracke, Mirko Schultis and local hero Renger van der Zande. The team won the race at Circuit Park Zandvoort after an exciting battle in the opening hours with the No. 9 Scuderia Praha Ferrari 458 GT3 Italia .
After three fantastic opening hours of the race on Friday, the Hankook 12H ZANDVOORT resumed on Saturday with a very interesting GT fight in the A6 class. Where it was first the No. 2 Hofor Racing Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 (Michael Kroll/Roland Eggimann/Kenneth Heyer/Christiaan Frankenhout/Maximilian Buhk) leading the race, it was the No. 9 Scuderia Praha Ferrari 458 GT3 (Jiri Pisarik/Jaromir Jirik/Peter Kox) that took over the lead in the fifth hour. But it didn’t take long for the No. 33 Car Collection Motorsport Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 (Peter Schmidt/Christian Bracke/Renger van der Zande/Mirko Schultis) to charge to the first position in the sixth hour. In the ninth hour the Scuderia Praha Ferrari managed to fight back in the lead, thanks to a successful pit stop strategy. Unfortunately, a few laps later, the Ferrari was involved in an incident, which forced the team to retire from the race. After the retirement, the No. 33 Car Collection Motorsport Mercedes-Benz SLS took over the lead, which it kept until the chequered flag. The No. 2 Hofor Racing Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 finished in second place, just before the No. 3 Car Collection Motorsport Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 (Johannes Dr. Kirchhoff/Gustav Edelhoff/Elmar Grimm).
Hofor Racing Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3s lock out front row for inaugural Hankook 12H ZANDVOORT
“We have the potential to be in contention for victory,” German driver Maximilian Buhk announced prior to qualifying for the inaugural Hankook 12H ZANDVOORT. Sure enough, the 21-year old German put the No. 1 Hofor Racing Mercedes-Benz (#1, Michael Kroll/Roland Eggimann/Kenneth Heyer/Christiaan Frankenhout/Maximilian Buhk) on pole in qualifying with a fastest time of 1:39.998 minutes. The Swiss team’s sister car with exactly the same driver line-up (#2, Michael Kroll/Roland Eggimann/Kenneth Heyer/Christiaan Frankenhout/Maximilian Buhk) qualified second in the hands of Christiaan Frankenhout with a time of 1:40.386 minutes, followed by the Scuderia Praha Ferrari 458 GT3 (#9, Jiri Pisarik/Jaromir Jirik/Peter Kox), driven to a lap time of 1:41.021 minutes by Peter Kox.
Mercedes-Benz, Ferrari, Corvette: three different brands fill the top three after first part Hankook 12H ZANDVOORT
ZANDVOORT (May 30, 2014) – The No. 2 Hofor Racing Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 (#2, Michael Kroll/Roland Eggimann/Kenneth Heyer/Christiaan Frankenhout/Maximilian Buhk) was in the lead as the chequered flag was waved to mark the end of the first three hours of racing in the inaugural Hankook 12H ZANDVOORT. In today’s first part of the race, the team racked up a total of 95 laps. The Scuderia Praha Ferrari 458 GT3 (#9, Jiri Pisarik/Jaromir Jirik/Peter Kox) was classified second, the V8 Racing Corvette (#5, Alex van ‘t Hoff/Rick Abresch/Diederik Sijthoff) came third and the fastest of the two Car Collection Motorsport Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3s (#33, Peter Schmidt/Christian Bracke/Renger van der Zande/Mirko Schultis) finished fourth. All these cars were on the lead lap. They will start the second part of the race tomorrow at 10 am on the same lap. Next up will be the Las Moras Racing Team’s Renault Mégane Trophy (#90, Luc Braams/Jan-Joris Verheul/Jörg Viebahn), the leader of the SP2 class in fifth place overall, two laps down.
The opening stages of the race saw a frenetic battle between Hofor Racing’s two Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 cars (#1, Michael Kroll/Roland Eggimann/Kenneth Heyer/Christiaan Frankenhout/Maximilian Buhk and #2, Michael Kroll/Roland Eggimann/Kenneth Heyer/Christiaan Frankenhout/Maximilian Buhk), with Buhk driving the No. 1 car and Frankenhout driving the No. 2 car. The No. 1 car, however, then dropped back due to technical issues. That allowed other cars to come to the fore. Peter Kox moved up through the ranks with the Scuderia Praha Ferrari after starting driver Jiri Pisarik had lost ground. The Corvette also made good progress following a crash in qualifying while the No. 33 Car Collection Mercedes-Benz, sporting a beautiful Martini livery, lost a little bit of time when one of the gullwing doors opened while on track, but the team were happy after a good run following technical issues in qualifying.
