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Vallelunga ELMS

02/09/2001

Wolfgang Kaufmann

At Vallelunga

Wolfgang Kaufmann - one of the outright quickest GT drivers out there, former rival of Michael Schumacher and Heinz-Harald Frentzen (he beat them both) and genuine nice guy. He probably races in more GT events than anyone else (FIA GTs, French and Spanish Championships - he even raced in the Privilege series in a 911 GT1). This is his race at Vallelunga, sharing with car owner Paco Orti.

We were the quickest GT car on Friday, but the team decided to change the car to try to find a better set-up. It was worse all day on Saturday, and the balance wasn't right at all. We were six or seven tenths slower, so I started from sixth on the grid. But for the race, we had a good balance again. Sixth on the grid is OK though.

I overtook the other five and took the lead! We had planned two stops, and Paco Orti was going to drive the middle stint. This put us at a disadvantage compared to most of the other GT cars, but in the end we made four stops! I had a ten to 15 second lead when I pited for the first time at 55 minutes, for fuel only. Although I'd driven hard, the tyres were still OK.

Paco ran well for 35 minutes, and then we planned to take on new tyres and, obviously, enough fuel to get to the end of the race. That's when the trouble started. An air gun broke, and we were in a big mess, so the pit stop wasted a lot of time. In the confusion, I ran over an air line on the way out.

I was called in for a stop and go penalty, and that should have been the end of our problems. Then I had a call over the radio that one of the locking pins might not have been in place on one of the wheels. The team were sure they were all in place, but a marshal suggested one was missing, so I had to come in for our fourth stop! Of course, all the pins were in, but at least now I could go flat out to the finish.

I thought we had no chance at all of a good result, but I was catching, catching, and managed to bring the car home in third place. That's not too bad, is it, after four pit stops? Paco Orti's car is a standard Porsche, so we were very pleased to come home third. Maybe without those problems, we could have won it, as everyone else had problems - but smaller ones.

Next stop for Wolfgang is the French GT Championship this weekend, sharing with Vallelunga rival Cyrille Chateau.