Thursday, 28.03.2024 | Deutsch | English
Truck-GP at the Ring – This and That

Truck-GP at the Ring – This and That

29. July 2010For the audience of 202,000 the 25th Truck Grand Prix turned out to be a big event just as they had imagined it to be. The only small downer was the torrential rain on Friday afternoon. Some people got soaked several times and some equipment never really dried out that weekend. And also the supporting programme with the drift challenge and the go-and-stop contest was affected by the floods. And there was no chance to postpone an event, because the side shows around the races were so tightly scheduled that there was hardly a minute to pause for breath. However, the truck racers fully concentrated on the race activities, pausing only to sign autographs.
But Hans-Joachim Stuck, Gerd Körber and TruckRace novice Hendrik Vieth evidently felt that taking part in truck racing alone was below their ‘capacity limit’. Originally it was Stuck’s brainchild, but later the other two joined in, and they decided to compete against reigning DTM Champion Timo Scheider in his Audi. While Stuck and Körber took part in the Mittelrhein Cup race where the schedule did not clash with the time for the duel, Vieth’s agenda for the TGP weekend looked quite different: two timed practice sessions and four races, not to mention the free practices, so that after the challenge round the Mercedes Benz Truck works team sweated blood, because they had a window of only a few minutes to replace a damaged brake disc. And when Vieht turned into the pit lane the light had already changed to red. As a consequence the Mercedes Benz ‘Silberpfeil’ had to start from the pit lane, trailing behind the field. But Vieht managed to slice past 12 rivals and finished in 14th. And also the other German pilots performed really well.
After gaining second podium place in the Mittelrhein Cup in his privately funded Iveco ‘Schwabentruck’, Gerd Körber was cheered by his fans as though he had won the championship. Uwe Nittel in his Buggyra could not take a podium spot this time, but he moved even closer to the top pilots in the championship standing.
Crowd favourite Jochen Hahn was a bit ill-starred. In the first SuperPole he was relegated for overspeeding; probably caused by the GPS antenna placed in a rather unfavourable position. On Sunday his MAN spun right at the start and he had to work his way through the pack. And also Markus Oestreich, who was forced to retire due to technical problems in the first race on Saturday, showed the same parforce run in his MKR Renault in the second race. And on Sunday the tall man from Fulda gained a podium twice – and once even took the win.
Rarely, if ever, has the podium seen so many different people. In every race another pilot came out the winner. The Spaniard Antonio Albacete was the only one to take a podium place in all four races, and he is also the top scorer of the weekend with a total of 52 points collected during the event. His nearest rivals Markus Bösiger (MKR-Renault) and Hahn were not really able to keep up with the Spaniard this weekend; however, the Swiss now sits 11 points clear of the German MAN pilot. It was the first time for Bösiger since his hand fracture that he drove his truck with the steel and screws removed from his bones, but in the intervals between the races his right hand was always put in a splint and strapped – just to go easy on his hand, so the MKR pilot said. Even so, it seems that Bösiger is still not totally free of pain. So it remains to be seen what happens, when the (almost) 53 year old will be fully fit again.
The TGP weekend was rather exhausting and stressful for the truck racers, but nonetheless, almost all the discussions and speculations revolved around the upcoming journey to Russia.
On Friday afternoon at the meeting of the group that is going to travel to Smolensk – presumably 12–13 out of the 22 registered FIA pilots will participate in Smolensk – there were some rather controversial discussions. Somebody remarked that the preparation time required for this journey took more time than for all the other races taken together. Now the itinerary has changed: For safety reasons there won’t be a transit journey via Belarus, but through Lithuania and Latvia – a detour of about 450 km. Several truck racers and team members as well as the officials will take a plane, so that they are hardly affected by all the problems arising continuously. But those people who transport the race trucks and the entire equipment – and without those things there would not be any races in Smolensk – will have been on the road for almost one week by the time the others board their planes. And the convoy won’t start the journey back home before Tuesday following the event. This means that some participants will be en route for almost 2 weeks.
And there are still a lot of questions which were not yet definitely clarified regarding the tariff and import regulations for the huge equipment. A matter such as motorsports is not an issue in the relevant, current and universally accessible regulations. And there are still several unknown factors that cannot be resolved before reaching the Russian border. But the former truck racer Mike Konovalov will by then be available to provide his help and assistance.