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| Season 2007 > News |
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The last time the FIA GT teams set up camp around a street circuit was Helsinki in 1997. For the third round of the 2007 FIA GT-championship the caravan moved to the boulevards of Bucharest. The heavy GT1 and GT2 monsters were to take on the newly designed street circuit in the heart of the capital. The design of this unique street circuit took one month to complete. With the palace of Nicolae Ceausescu in the background Jos Menten and Peter Kox with their Lamborghini Murciélago R-GT took on the fight with the Maseratis, Corvettes and Aston Martins.
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The weather gods were fully determined to make it an exiting spectacle. The heavens opened up on a regular basis ensuring some slippery activities. During the first free practice session Menten and Kox concentrated on the set-up of their Lamborghini: “These variable weather conditions make it difficult to find the ideal set-up. On the wet track we are fast, but the GT2s seem to have the advantage. Should it rain tomorrow there’s a good chance that a Ferrari or a Porsche will win”, Menten commented after the first practice. For the second practice session the ideal race line appears dry. The All-Inkl.com Reiter Lamborghini-duo is well on course and at the end of the session Jos Menten clocks up the ninth best time: “We dedicated this particular session to a complete analyses of the tyre compounds. Notwithstanding a red code as the result of a crash by a Ferrari, we were able to fully complete our tyre programme. We’re one and a half seconds behind the fastest Maserati and this gives us great hopes for the race.”
For the first time this season Jos Menten took on the qualifying session. The driver from the Limburg raced through to an eighth place and was just faster than the twin car of Bouchut-Mücke: “It could have been slightly faster. Unfortunately during my fastest lap I lost two tenths due to traffic … and looking back it makes you sick. A place amongst the top 5 was feasible, but all in all I’m happy with the fourth row of the grid. We couldn’t have attacked the top three. The Maseratis are in a class of their own”, the driver from Haelen told us after the qualifying session. The rain makes an appearance once again on Sunday morning for the warm-up. The team management decide not to take any risks and merely carry out a few check-out laps.
At 14:15hrs local time the lights turn to green, and after two laps behind the safety-car the three leading Maseratis charge off ahead of the pack. Due to the ongoing rainstorm the start is chaotic. In the first few laps some five cars are forced to retire. Jos Menten remains in the middle of the pack avoiding any problems and slowly climbs up to seventh place. Due to the debris on the track the safety-car appears once again and All-Inkl.com Reiter Lamborghini team takes full advantage of this. Almost all the teams come in for a driver – tyre change. Jos Menten in the Lambo comes in in sixth place. A super fast pitstop allows Peter Kox to reappear on track in fourth spot, with team mate Stefan Mücke just behind him. The race tilts in favour of the All-Inkl.com Reiter Lamborghini… but once again Lady Luck is not on the Dutch duo’s side.
“I had a good start and I was able to steer clear of any problems. My lap times were in no way inferior to those of the leaders. The car was handling superbly in the wet conditions. In the beginning of the race we could have been somewhat faster, but we hadn’t shod the car with full-wets. Even so at a given moment our Lamborghinis were the fastest cars on the track! A podium place was in the offing … but unfortunately Peter made contact with a concrete wall, and you pay that mistake cash. The left front suspension broke and there was no point in carrying on the race”, a disappointed Jos Menten commented after the race. The twin car of Bouchut-Mücke finished in second place.
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20-05-2007 |
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