Mirage Racing assume the Pro-Am class lead going into final round of the GT4 European Series

 

A double Pro-Am class win at the Nurburgring this weekend was enough for the #7 Mirage Racing Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT4 pairing of Stanislav Safronov and Alexandre Vaintrub to leapfrog into the lead of the class as the GT4 European Series heads to Barcelona for the conclusion of their season next month.

A wet introduction into the race weekend was thankfully replaced with a clear and dry (albeit delayed for earlier kerb damage around the circuit) hour long race into Saturday evening after the #7 car had claimed its first overall pole position of the year.

Alongside them in the thirty-eight strong entry was the #39 Racing Spirit of Leman AMR of Clement Seyler who also secured pole in the silver class sentry that he shares with Baudouin Detout whist each sister car was further back in P9 for the #5 Mirage Racing car of Roberto Faria and Ruben Del Sarte and P23 for the #74 RSLM entry of David Kullmann and Will Orton.

For the latter crew, however, their race weekend abruptly ended between turns 1 and 2 as Kullmann was an apparent victim of secondary contact (maybe from the Ford Mustang that also stopped at the same position on track) to end their day early with front quarter damage whilst Orton’s best qualifying performance for race 2 in P4 never materialised thanks to a late electrical problem before the cars even assembled on the grid.

The #5 Mirage AMR of Faria would also be in the wars before they had even crossed the control line to start the race as the Brazilian jinxed out of line early to try and pass the overall championship leading Audi, only to make contact with the #3 car – effectively putting them both out of the race.

For the other two cars, by the end of the another highly eventful GT4 European Series the #7 Mirage held onto their Pro-Am class win finishing sixth overall whilst the #39 RSLM crew would have their best finish of the year finishing just off the overall (and class) podium in fourth.

Sunday’s finale was another strange bag of fortunes or misfortunes within the series as (already said) the #74 RSLM AMR failed to make the race again whilst the other three crews had to start from the midst of the pack with the #5 Mirage car being the best of the three starting from P10.

Not without its own incidents and accidents again, the start to the race was at least a much cleaner affair with the remaining participants allowed to settle down into their own rhythm. However, it was again only the #7 car that pushed through for any class recognition by the end as they left it late to make the final pass on track to take their second class win of the day down in P11 overall whilst the remaining silver class crews finished P12 for the #39 car and P14 in silver for the #5 crew.

Safronov and Vaintrub now take a slender 8 points margin into the final races of the season in Barcelona in mid-October.

Photo credits – Teams / series / social media