7.09.15 Zolder victory brightens Kaufmann's weekend

Wolfgang Kaufmann and Dieter Dörmann win the Youngtimer Trophy race at Zolder – uneventful race at the Nürburgring.

Delight and disappointment are not far apart, as the past weekend proved for Wolfgang Kaufmann. Again, the racer from Molsberg in Germany hat two separate drives on two very different tracks on his agenda.

For starters, he went to the Nürburgring for the 38th DMV Grenzlandrennen, the sixth round of the VLN endurance championship, where he once again stepped into the Kremer Racing Porsche 997 GT3 KR. Built be the famous team from Cologne, the car visually resembles the current GT3 cars that fight for overall wins in the VLN; technically, the Kremer car is based on a 2010 Cup racer, and also uses its mechanical parts.

The car was once again slotted into the SP-PRO class, and therefore choked with an air restrictor which meant an even more significant power deficit compared with its rival, an ex-GT2 Porsche. A solid qualifying run led into a trouble-free race and a 2nd place finish in class, albeit two laps down on the winner, in a race that brought little enjoyment for the team or the driver.

All this had Wolfgang Kaufmann looking forward to his other assignment on the weekend, the Youngtimer Trophy at the Zolder circuit in Belgium. There, a Ford Escort MK.I was waiting to be pedaled in an appropriate manner. As the VLN race coincided with the Youngtimers' qualifying, Kaufmann's team mate Dieter Dörmann qualified the car by himself and put the Escort in position 4 on the grid.

As the professional driver on the team, Kaufmann had a 24 minute stint ahead of him, and also got to take the start. He immediately put the 40+ year old Ford at the head of the Youngtimer field. Not only did the competition get to see the car's headlights, Kaufmann also pulled further and further away with every lap. His enjoyment of such pure racing also seemed to bring his lap times down, as witnessed by an advantage of no less than 1.28 minutes – or almost a whole lap - over the rest of the field.

After the driver change, Dieter Dörmann then took the Escort to victory in the Youngtimer race at Zolder – a positive conclusion to Wolfgang Kaufmann's racing weekend.