Truck Grand Prix Preliminary Report

11. July 2012The Truck Grand Prix at Nürburgring, does not only trigger euphoria for those involved in the FIA European Truck Racing Championship, but also a lot of stress. The TGP simply is the race of the races. On Tuesday the first teams already gathered at Nürburgring and the construction workers who set up the huge tents from MAN and Mercedes–Benz were there even earlier. There have been speculations about Frankie OXXO Truck Racing Team: On the weekend it was said that the multinational (Czech, Hungarian and Russian) MAN – group will not attend the TGP, even though, the three drivers, Frankie Vojtisek, Norbert Kiss and Alexander Lvov, have signed up. One said that only Kiss would not attend, others on the other hand claimed that Lvov, who had not been racing at all yet, will be the only one being at the starting line for the East-Power-Team. The FIA enforced the team to make some technical changes prior to the TGP. Perhaps that did not work out. No one will fully know, until the team will put up its race trucks at Nürburgring.
Another Russian driver, Iurii Egorov, is going to race for the FIA ETRC for the first time. He will be driving another Buggyra Freightliner. For the first time this year, Steffi Halm is participating in a FIA race. The young German woman, who, last year was still driving the tankpool24-Mercedes, which is now being driven by Ellen Lohr, will be racing in a MAN from the Lion–team this year. Meanwhile, Halm is putting the French Championship under pressure with her A-MAN-Truck.
The Frenchman Ludovic Faure, who is the European Champion of 1998, is also racing for the Lion-Team. And another Champion, Heinz-Werner Lenz (GER), from previous years is going to be there as well. He is the king of the Ring. The three-time Champion will drive his Mercedes in the FIA races and his son Sascha will be driving the second one of their Mercedes’ race trucks in the Mittelrhein-Cup. This is also where the Austrian Markus Altenstrasser is driving the second Iveco of the Schwabentruck–Team, while his German teammate Gerd Körber wants to collect some “FIA points” as a race-by-race driver again. There is also Ellen Lohr (Mercedes-Benz), Jochen Hahn, René Reinert (both MAN) and Markus Oestreich (Renault) as four other drivers from Germany. The host country is therefore well represented among the 27 race trucks for the FIA races.
The weather forecast is rather negative, but also contradictory, meaning, overall, not the way you would wish for it to be. Contrary to this time of the year it will stay rather cold and combined with wind gusts, many fans will be hit by rainstorms – the typical weather for Nürbrurgring.