André Kursim and Roland Rehfeld will race for tankpool24
04. March 2015The new tankpool24 Mercedes-Benz team that will take part in the upcoming FIA European Truck Racing Championship season was presented to the fans at Markus Oestreich’s NOLimit karting facility in Fulda on 4th of March. The popular veteran truck racer, commonly referred to in the paddock by the diminutive “Oese”, is mentor for tankpool24 regular André Kursim, and his son Moritz also once partnered Kursim in the team. Oese has, moreover, shared his cockpit with both youngsters in a variety of endurance races.
Even newcomer Roland Rehfeld, the 37-year-old from Berlin who joins Kursim this season at the MB-Motorsport-powered team, is an old acquaintance from his truckracing days. In one season of a stellar motorsport career spanning 32 years – beginning in the cub-class, karting like everyone else – Oese actually raced against Rehfeld who started in Category B of the SuperRaceTrucks in the FIA ETRC. That was 2001, the only year in which the SRT class was allowed two categories, both identical in every respect excepting for one particular. Category A consisted of newly built trucks with unconstricted turbo-compressor outlets, while trucks in category B were the previous year’s models that had 71mm-dia air restrictors.
In his only season in truck racing Rehfeld finished third in his category and was named Truckracing Rookie of the Year. One of his team bosses then was Markus Bauer.
Both Rehfeld and Bauer buried their truck racing ambitions thereafter. But Bauer resurrected his a few years ago and then succeeded in prevailing on Rehfeld to return.
The boy from Berlin, meanwhile, had lived out his passion for motor racing elsewhere. Having driven in Formula 3 before his excursion into truck racing, he subsequently spent several profitable years in the NASCAR series in North America.
A few seasons ago he then switched to endurance racing, driving a Mercedes AMG SLS GT3 in the 24 Hours of Nürburgring, among other events. At the moment he also serves as a test driver and instructor for AMG, Mercedes’ high performance and racing arm.
Twenty-three-year-old Kursim may not evince all those distinctions, but he can boast more actual truck racing experience, having driven for tankpool24 in the FIA ETRC since Jarama 2013.
Now that all teams in the fray are on their own, with no factory support anymore, the tiny private Mercedes-Benz team must surely fancy its chances.
The plan is to enter nine of the 10 events. The tankpool24 team would have loved to race in Nogaro, like it has in all its four seasons heretofore, but had to give up the idea because of the impossibly brief interval before the Truck Grand Prix at the Nürburgring, the climactic event of the season. This season’s calendar allows for only three days between the racing Sunday in Nogaro and the official PR day at the TGP — three short days in which the marquees have to be knocked down, tonnes of equipment transported 1,300 km away, and everything set up and running once again at the Ring. Not to forget the servicing of the race trucks. The risk of running into problems and not being able to get ready in time was simply too great for tankpool24 and Markus Bauer had no choice but to pass up participation in Nogaro.
Impressions:
