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VLN
Nordschleife specialists Mathilda Racing
returned to victory in the VLN’s fifth
round, the 6-hour ADAC Ruhr-Pokal-
Rennen.
The team’s CUPRA, driven by Matthias
Wasel, Fredric Yerly and Roland Schmid
completed 37 laps of the road course in
the Eifel forest and was classified 21st
overall out of the 144 starters. This was
the third victory of the season so far for
the #806 car.
In the first part of the 6-hour race, a
three-way fight developed in the TCR
class between the CUPRA, one of the two
Max Kruse Racing Volkswagen Golf GTI
cars and the Møller Bil Motorsport Audi
RS 3 LMS. The three cars took turns to
lead, but good strategy and perfect pit
stops helped the Mathilda Racing CUPRA
to build a comfortable lead over the final
two hours.
The Norwegian team of Håkon Schjærin,
Atle Gulbrandsen, Kenneth Østvold and
Anders Lindstad placed the Møller Bil
Motorsport Audi in second place, one lap
behind the winners.
The Max Kruse Racing Golf GTI cars that
finished 1-2 in the previous event of the
series had a dismal weekend. Benjamin
Leuchter and Andreas Gülden did not
MathildaRacingreturnstovictory
Round 5 – Saturday 4 August,
Nürburgring Nordschleife
1. Wasel/Yerly/Schmid (Mathilda
Racing, CUPRA); 2.
Schjærin/Gulbrandsen/Østvold/
Lindstad (Møller Bil Motorsport, Audi
RS 3 LMS); 3. Preisig/Prattes (Max
Kruse Racing, Volkswagen Golf GTI)
post a qualifying lap due to a gearbox
issue; the team managed to rebuild the
gearbox in time to allow them to start
from the back of the grid, but they
were halted after two laps by brake
failure. The sister car of Loris Prattes
and Jasmin Preisig was running in
second place until it too suffered from
a gearbox issue and retired with only
ten minutes to go.
The VLN will resume with round 6 on
September 7th.