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2011
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OSCHERSLEBEN - Round 7, August 24th - 25th Pictures at bottom of page Qualifying
was once again dominated by the Chinese Zongshen team – but in Suzuka both
bikes had failed to finish with chassis problems and needed to do well here to
consolidate (or even win) the World Championship. The
permanent German teams had a huge fan-base here and were hoping for a home win
– but Police22, Moto38 and Phase One knew that double points here would put
them right back in the title race and were pulling out all the stops. GMT94 had
drafted in 23 tear old David Checa, the brother of GP1 Yamaha’s Carlos Checa,
Police Nationale 22 had brought across Takaharu Kishida from their involvement
with Tsukigi Racing in Japan and Phase One had brought another American, Josh Hayes, the current AMA
Superstock Championship leader in to their Senior team to partner Jason Pridmore
and James Ellison. Jason qualified in 3rd after initially being
unsure of a race start, as he had racing schools to teach in the U.S up until
the Tuesday before the race. Once
again, there was a fight between the Zongshen numbers 1 and 2 for pole position.
With Igor Jerman moving to the No.1 bike for Germany, it was Bruno Bonhuil,
Pierrot Lerat Vanstaen and Piergiorgio Bontempi in 2nd on the grid
for the No.2 Suzuki – but once again the team of Igor Jerman, Stephane Mertens
and Warwick Nowland outqualified the field, with Warwick the only rider under
the 1 minute 30 second mark Saturday
was the start of the race and it rained a fair bit in the morning, with quite a
few riders worried about the lack of wet weather practice – but the forecast
was for a completely dry 24 hours for the race and by 2pm the rain had stopped
and the track would be dry for the 3pm start…the forecast called for a high of
25°C, a low of 14°C. There
were still damp patches but they were off the racing line and all the bike were
on slicks European
Stunt Champion Craig Jones and his team had warmed the crowd up before the start
with a wicked display – but I was a bit worried when his team parked their
Buells on their back racks and fuel was dripping out of the tanks onto the
circuit…more of that later. The
highest-placed German wildcard was the OBI-Shell No.111 in 8th place
but there were a host of others being cheered – entries from Ducati
Rheinhessen, Triumph Germany and Team Hannover running a stock belt-drive Buell
Firebolt. There
was a bit of a jump start but that’s not really a factor in a 24 hour race –
once again Zongshen got the holeshot – but in the middle of the grid, Rico
Penzkofer had spun up the rear tyre and dumped the OBI-Shell Yamaha on it’s
left-hand side, wearing through the engine casing. He blamed the Phase One
Junior team for leaving some oil at the start…but I think he just hit the
remainder of the fuel left on the circuit by the stunt Buells. He got away in
last place and would leave a trail of oil through the first left-hand corner (Hasseröder). Meanwhile, Piergiorgio Bontempi had got away in the lead on the Zongshen No.2, followed by GMT94, Moto38, Zongshen No.1, Phase One No.3, KFM-Herber No.4, the French Police 22 in 7th, Yamaha Austria 8th, Bollinger Kawasaki 9th and Bridgestone Bikers No.47 in 10th. Coming around the back of the circuit and Yamaha Moto38 was in 2nd place, with GMT94, Zongshen No.1 and Phase One No.3 opening a gap to the best placed German team, the KFM-Herber No.4 Suzuki. As they finished the first lap, Bontempi had a good lead over Moto38, who was alongside GMT94 with the Zongshen No.1 and Phase One chasing. The
first corner – a long right-hander and no problems…but next was the Hasseröder
left-hander…Bontempi on the No.2 got through it OK…but the sound of scraping
metal and plastic meant that somebody had come off. Warwick Nowland on the
Zongshen No.1 down, Moto38, and Yamaha Austria No.9 – a bike running over
rider Karl Truchsess’ foot, GMT94 and the Police Nationale 22 were also in the
gravel. To
add insult to injury, both Zongshen and GMT94 had stop-and-go penalties. They
were both trying to get back to the pits as quickly as possible and rode the
bikes through the short-cut…going through the short-cut is OK but only if you
PUSH the bike. As they both rode through it, they got penalized. Jason Pridmore on the Phase One No.3 and Bontempi on the Zongshen No.2 both avoided crashing and both bikes were together on the track. Pridmore commented, “…That’s a little more action than we need for the first hour of a 24 hour race” The 2nd lap crash may have been bad for some – but not for the No.8 Bollinger Kawasaki. The Swiss team was now fighting over 3rd place with wildcards Bridgestone Bikers on their No.47 Suzuki GSXR750. The Zongshen No.1 Suzuki had lost 5 laps in the crash and Slovenian Igor Jerman was now on the bike and trying to make up places. Lap 111 and the Bergman & Söhne GSXR1000 had a spectacular crash at the final corner (same as Yanagawa’s famous Kawasaki crash – but without the flames), the rider was lucky to walk away but the No.17 Suzuki was far too damaged to continue. After
120 laps, Igor Jerman crashed at the fast triple, breaking his elbow and wrist,
(from the sound of things, 2 ribs as well) – and the points leaders were out of the race,
incredibly bad luck for the Championship leaders. 6
hours into the race - Zongshen No.2 were still leading with the Phase One No.3
only 30 seconds behind them – but the GMT94 and Moto38 Yamahas had been able
to leap frog all the other teams by superb riding and pit strategy to go 3rd
and 4th, David Checa putting in consistent low 1 minute 32 second
laps. 10:15 - the Buell Firebolt was in the pits with gear selector problems. 10:30 and the No 83 PS Kawasaki Z1000 crashed, no brakes into the Hasseröder corner – the lights were still on, but that’s all that was working. 5 minutes later and after 252 laps Hans Herber was seen pushing the KFM-Herber Suzuki into the pits – I don’t know what had happened but he definitely directed some bitter remark at the GMT pit as he pushed the bike past – though I didn’t see any bike damage from where I was standing. 8
hours of racing and hard riding from the Phase One team had put the No.3 into
the lead; brake problems had held the Zongshen No.2 up in the pits. 11
hours into the race and GMT94 had got up to 2nd place with Moto38 in
third. The Phase One No.3 team was still leading but GMT’s David Checa was as
fast at night as he was during daylight. As
dawn broke over the track we’d also lost No.666, the British Diablo team in a
crash but no injuries at 02:45, the No84 EMPP Suzuki and the Buell Firebolt
(which had been in 29th place) was in the pits with a suspected
cracked piston and bits of metal in the oil. They would keep the pit open and
rejoin the race for the last few laps to record a finish but they didn’t think
that the totally standard (apart from the ceramic brake discs, which I was told
were now available for the road bike – they glow bright orange!) bike would
last, running constantly until the end. Then
at 06:55 Josh Hayes crashed the No.3 bike at the first corner – the team took
only 6 minutes 42 seconds to repair the light damage - but they were suddenly 3
laps down. There
was another Yamaha in the hunt as well; the LMJ Moto38 team had also fought up
from the lap 2 crash and the team of David Morillon, Bernard Cuzin and Christian
Haquin were now only 3 laps behind Phase One, in 3rd place.
With double points on offer
for Oschersleben, it was down to Phase One to make no more mistakes. The
Zongshen No.2 had been held up mainly by having to change a clutch and were no
longer in the hunt for the win, down in 4th place The
Yamaha Austria No.6 Superbike Yamaha, also caught up in the lap 2 crash was up
to 5th place and ran for the rest of the race with a bent handlebar,
Manager Mandy Kainz electing to keep going without fixing it and hoping that the
riders would be able to cope with it. The cooling system problems they had in previous races
were cured – apparently their radiator fabricator had extended the area of the
radiator but hadn’t relocated the coolant outlets, so even with the extra area
the radiator was only getting coolant circulation in half it’s area – no
wonder the Superbike-spec Yamaha was suffering overheating problems…but there
was more trouble in store for the team. Karl
Truchsess brought the bike into the pits with a 2-inch hole in the downpipes of
the exhaust and to change it they had to drain the cooling system and take off
the radiator. This would lose 11 laps. Yamaha Austria got back on track 23 laps
down in 7th. In the pits for the last time, LMJ Moto38 in 3rd were still ahead of the remaining Zongshen bike. Also in for their last stop, Phase One No.3 were in 2nd place, 4 laps behind the leaders GMT94 who pitted at the same time, knowing that they controlled the race. With the Zongshen No.1 bike out of the race, the Phase One team could have stolen the World Championship here – but discretion ruled and the double points for 2nd place would not be thrown away. The outdated Bollinger ZX9R humbled many faster but less experienced teams and came home in 5th place. After 24 hours of racing, Christophe Guyot had proved that that Suzuki’s were not all-conquering; the Yamaha R1 had beaten them on the level playing field…and they owed a lot of their win to David Checa’s blistering speed. GMT94 also broke their own record for distance covered - 896 laps against their 2000 record of 864.
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