Nürburgring 1000km The Long and Winding Road

Nürburgring and Nordschleife.  There is no other combination of words in motorsport that evokes the same level of excitement and awe.  In order to maximize that excitement, the promotors of the Youngtimer Trophy, arguably the continent’s most successful historic touring car series, decided to add a 1000km race around the Nordschleife to its calendar.  “This is the third edition,” says organiser Stefan Eckhardt.  “Obviously, we’re trying to build on the history of the 1000km at the Nürburgring, although it used to be run for prototypes. 

By that time the Griesemann/ Griesemann 934/5 was more than a minute ahead of last year’s winners Peter Schumann/Jürg Schumann/ Olaf Manthey/Joachim Kiesch in the 635. Normally this should have been a comfortable margin, “unless the conditions play tricks on us.” grimaced a visibly tense Georg Griesemann as he was about to embark on his last stint.

The 1000km counts as a regular round of the Youngtimer Trophy, but, whereas we tend to fill up quickly for the shorter races, we’re going to have only 89 cars taking the start for this race.”  That may sound like a lot to you and me, but not to regular followers of the Youngtimer Trophy who are more used to entries numbering into the 150s.  “Obviously, it’s more expensive than other rounds. 

It all came to pieces for Hess when he made his second stop and felt something was not right at the left front end. He came back into the pits after a single lap of the Grand Prix loop, but the team could not find anything wrong and sent him back out. “This must have cost him at least four minutes,” rued one crew member, “We need something drastic to happen.”

The entry fee is higher and there is more wear and tear.  Quite a number of our regular runners are teaming up together for this one, sharing a single car rather than each running their own, so the results of this race should not affect the championship standings too much,” Eckhardt explains.  “What we would really love is to have more foreign teams joining this particular party.”  For an entry fee that doesn’t much exceed the equivalent in touristenfahrten you get to do 40 consecutive laps on this legendary racetrack. 

Read Jurriaan Tass’ Report in our October 2023 issue…