2022 NLS(Nürburgring Langstrecken-Serie) Round 7 Report

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The seventh round of the 2022 Nürburgring Langstrecken-Serie (NLS) took place on October 8th, Saturday.

Having completed two longer races, 6-hour and 12-hour, all of the remaining three events on the series calendar, including this round, would be held as 4-hour races. Accordingly, this seventh meeting of the season was run on the usual 4-hour race format, as the 90-minutes qualifying session began at 8:30 a.m. on Saturday and then the race at noon.

Walkenhorst Motorsport entered two BMW M4 GT3s again this time. The pair of Christian Krognes and Ben Tuch drove the no.34 car in the SP9 Pro class. And the gentlemen drivers in the no.39 car, the team owner Henry Walkenhorst and Friedrich Von Bohlen, was joined by Jörg Müller. The ex-WTCC driver was a well-known and proven touring car veteran. The trio competed in the SP9 Pro-Am class.

Looking back on the season, there was no doubt about the single-lap speed of the no.34 car. It claimed pole positions in the fourth and fifth rounds, followed by a close second grid in the last event. Therefore, expectations were high for the car to secure a good starting position for the race.

October has come, and the leaves in Eifel forest began to turn red or yellow, announcing autumn’s arrival. However, the sky over Nürburgring Nordschliefe was covered by thick dark clouds. As a result, it was pretty cold, with air/track temperatures at 10/11 degrees centigrade when the official qualifying session got underway.

The rain had already stopped, but the race track, which is more than 25km long, was still partly wet. So the drivers carefully went out to the circuit with headlights on, and Krognes did the same with the no.34 car. But he returned to the box without doing a timed lap, as he thought it was too early to make a qualifying attempt with the slick tires.

After waiting in the garage for a while, the no.34 car was sent back to the track with Tuck behind the wheel, as the time looked right now. Going through the forest of Eifel, he warmed up his tires diligently on the out lap, but there were wet patches from place to place, even on the regular driving lines. So many drivers went off the track or spun everywhere, and not a few sections were under “Code 60,” which was the maximum speed limit for safety reason.

And Tuck was no exception. He lost control of the car at Hatzenbach, a downhill section with a sequence of corners, and crashed. Fortunately, he was unhurt, but the car’s damage was too heavy to repair at the circuit, so the team had to withdraw the no.34 from the race, which was to start in a few hours.

The no.36 car got through the qualifying session in fifth in the class. Since the rain returned just before the race’s start, the teams’ decisions on which tire to start with were divided. Walkenhorst Motorsport opted for the wet tires for the start, but the no.36 cars came back to the pit after three laps, asking for the slicks, as the rain ceased and the track conditions improved.

With no more rain after that, the track surface was dry when the finishers of the 4-hour race saw the checkered flag. Thanks to the strong drive of the trio, the no.36 car stayed away from any trouble or accident and finished the race in fourth in the class, just one place shy of the podium.