Race Report

Formel 1 Grosser Preis von Deutschland 2011
GP3 SERIES

Circuit: Nürburgring (D), Length 5,148 km, 23^rd/24^th July 2011, Rounds 9 & 10
www.nuerburgring.de

JENZER MOTORSPORT 2011:
Nico Müller (CH), Maxim Zimin (RUS) and Vittorio Ghirelli (I)

Müller in the Top Ten

The GP3 Series met up for their fifth race meeting of the season, racing as one of the support races for the Formel 1 Grosser Preis von Deutschland 2011 on the popular Nürburgring circuit in Germany. The weather in the Eifel region was cool and rainy, as it so often is, and that added to the excitement of the weekend.

Race One Qualifying

Saturday, 09/07/11, 09.45 – 10.15, Weather: Overcast, 12°C

It was very cool and overcast, dark clouds boiling up in the sky. The first part of the qualifying session went well for Nico and Vittorio, who were both in the top ten before the tyre changes. After though Maxim spun off the track again, and was thus unable to improve his time in the end. Neither Nico nor Vittorio could get a clear lap and they both fell back down the order.

GP3 Series

Race One (30 Minutes)

Saturday, 23/07/11, 17.20, Weather: Rain, 14°C

Just as the GP3s formed up on the grid, heavy rain drops started falling. The sky was black in all directions and more rain was clearly on its way; the only question was when?

Most cars started on slicks, and it was a full nine laps into the race before it really started to rain. Nico was 11^th soon after the start, and not much later was up to 9^th, because Evans and da Costa were handed penalties after their teams worked too long on the cars on the grid. Vittorio was 14^th and Maxim 18^th when the rain really set in. The team decided to call Maxim to the pits to take a gamble on rain tyres, but it didn’t pay off because Maxim couldn’t take advantage of the better runner simply because of the multitude of yellow flags which meant no overtaking. Nico was also called in to the pits to change to wet weather tyres, but that didn’t leave him enough time to battle his way back up to the front; the best he could do was 15^th by the end of the race. Vittorio, meanwhile, finished the race without making a pitstop, but he was still only two places ahead of Nico, in 13^th.
The grid for the second race of the weekend was set by reversing the order of the first eight finishers in the first race, with the rest of the places set according to finishing order in the first race.

GP3 Series

Race Two (30 Minutes)

Sunday, 24/07/11, 09.20, Weather: Rain, 8°C

It rained all night and during the morning and the track was very wet when the race started. Even so the start went ahead as normal, and there were surprisingly few incidents. Vittorio was already up in 10^th after the first lap, with Nico directly behind him in 11^th. Maxim had a spin and lost several places that dropped him to 26^th. Meanwhile the rain had stopped and conditions started to improve very slowly. However, the track was very slippery until the end which led to cars spinning off all over the place. Nico managed to overtake Vittorio and another car and was soon in 8^th after Williamson fell back. Then Vainio fell off, and Nico pulled off a nifty overtaking move on Daly. That put him 6^th which meant he was in with a chance of the last point up for grabs. However Calado was catching up and managed to outbrake Nico in one of the final corners; still Nico couldn’t complain too much about his final position. Elsewhere Vittorio was fighting it out with Haryanto and Williamson, and finished the race in a good 11^th after a very difficult battle. Maxim managed to make up a whole handful of places and finished the race with his car in one piece this time, ending up 15^th.

Championship standings after 10 out of 16 races:

1^st Alexander Sims (GB), 34 points; 2^nd Lewis Williamson (GB), 28 points; 3^rd Mitch Evans (NZ), 28 points; 4^th Nigel Melker (NL), 27 points; 5^th James Calado (GB), 27 points; 6^th Valtteri Bottas (FIN), 24 points; 10^th Nico Müller (CH), 14 points

2011 GP3 Series

For more information:

• www.gp3series.com
• www.italiaracing.net