Promising start into the season for Frikadelli Racing- Fifth place in the first VLN race
23.03.2019
The Frikadelli Racing Team started the new season with a good result at the Nürburgring. The Porsche young professionals Mathieu Jaminet and Matt Campbell, who drove the new #31 Porsche 911 GT3 R, showed a great comeback and drove from the 27th to the fifth place. Sabine Schmitz, Alex Müller and Klaus Abbelen finished on the 16th place in the sister-car.
“I'm very happy with our performance in the first race. Aside from our GT3 cars, the Porsche Cayman GT4 driven by Hendrik von Danwitz and “Jules" finished on a good fifth place in the highly competitive Cup3-class. Surely we still have a lot of work to do before the 24 hour race, but we already have a good base on which we can build on”, recognised team manager Klaus Abbelen after the race.
The first race of the season mutated into a real waiting game in the beginning. Dense fog around the Nürburgring Nordschleife led to the morning qualifying being delayed four hours and shortened to 60 minutes. Several yellow- and code60-phases aggravated the chase for laptimes. In addition to that luck was not a friend of the Frikadelli Racing Team. While Sabine Schmitz, Alex Müller and Klaus Abbelen could set the 17. fastest time, Matt Campbell and Mathieu Jaminet ranked on the 27th place. But in the race especially the Porsche Young Professionals could get a much better position.
Campbell already made up many positions at the start and then passes on the car to Jaminet. The reigning ADAC GT Masters champion continued the comeback and saved the fifth place in the first race for the new 911 GT3 R. Sabine Schmitz, Klaus Abbelen and Alex Müller constantly stayed in the top-15 with the tried and tested Porsche 911 GT3 R. At the end of the shortened race the trio saw the checkers flag on the 16th place.
Voices after the race:
Matt Campbell (Porsche 911 #31): “The qualifying surely wasn’t ideal for us, as we wanted to started a few place more in front. Although the race was much better and we could get a good result. But today it was much more important to gather data with the new car for the 24 hour race. We achieved that gathered a lot of experience.”
Mathieu Jaminet (Porsche 911 #31): “Before the race I didn’t believe that we could achieve such a good place in the end. But our pace was very good and the whole Frikadelli Racing Team did a great job. Especially the end of the race was extremely thrilling. I had a great fight with Klaus Bachler, who drove the Falken Porsche 911 GT3 R, over several laps. A bit later a Mercedes AMG GT3 was added to our battle and I was able to get it in the end. Everyone fought fair. That’s how motorsport is fun.”
Alex Müller (Porsche 911 #30): “Due to many yellow- and code60-phases it was hard to set a good lap in Qualifing. In addition to that I was hold up by traffic in several places where I lost a lot of momentum. Despite that, we just lost three seconds on the fastest of the new Porsche 911 GT3 R, and that’s quite good. In the race we didn’t have problems and reeled of our schedule. We started were we finished in 2018. Moreover we achieved to improve some things on our set-up.”
Sabine Schmitz (Porsche 911 #30): “I haven’t been driving this car for a ¾ year now, so it was like a fresh start in the beginning. But I found my way very quickly and felt good behind the wheel. In the beginning we had a bit of understeer, but we fixed it later. After all I’m very happy with my laptimes and am geared up to do the next race.”
