ETCC Round 5 – Brno

FIA European Touring Car Championship
Round 5 – Brno, Czech Republic, 29/30 May 2004
BMW LEADS THE WAY AS SERIES APPROACHES MID SEASON

Munich, 24 May, 2004. There is a feeling of satisfaction, although not complacency, among the BMW national teams as the FIA European Touring Car Championship reaches the midway point in Brno (CZE). The satisfaction is because there is a BMW driver or team heading all the different championship categories, but the teams know how hard the next six races will be.

BMW leads the Manufacturers’ Championship, Jörg Müller (GER) and Dirk Müller (GER) are first and second in the Drivers’ Championship, their team, BMW Team Deutschland – Schnitzer Motorsport, is the highest points scorer in the Teams’ Championship and Tom Coronel (NLD), who drives a BMW 320i for Carly Motors, is in front of the Independents’ Trophy class. This situation is thanks to a lot of hard work all season, which culminated in a superb racing weekend on BMW’s home ground in Hockenheim.

In 2003 the Brno circuit was very good to the BMW 320i drivers. Dirk Müller (BMW Team Deutschland) won the first race, Andy Priaulx (GBR) won the second and his first for BMW Team Great Britain, while Antonio Garcia (ESP) was the first BMW driver to claim pole in 2003 and scored his first second place for BMW Team Italy-Spain.

Whatever memories the drivers have of the circuit, they can be nothing compared to those of Schnitzer Motorsport’s Team Manager, Charly Lamm. It was as a fresh faced youth that he first visited this track, which in those days was very different. “I remember my first race there in 1971, which was also an ETCC event, and I was a timekeeper with Schnitzer. It was the Brno four hour race, held on the old street circuit. In those days the Czech Republic was still in Eastern Europe. It used to take hours to cross the borders and we all needed to apply for visas,“ he explained.

No doubt Charly has many tales to tell about his times there as he had some rather famous drivers in his cars. His return after that first visit was in 1983 with the BMW 635CSi: “We went there with this car between ‘83 and ’86. We had some wild and interesting times when Gerhard Berger and Roberto Ravaglia were sharing the car in ’84, ‘85 and ‘86. The track at that time was extremely fast, with very fast, blind corners through a village. It was exactly the kind of circuit which the young Gerhard Berger needed to prove his skills as a racing driver. I have some very special memories of Gerhard qualifying the BMW 635CSi against the mighty Jaguars and Rovers of Tom Walkinshaw.“

Charly was also there in 1987 when the circuit, as it is today, was opened: “We were there racing in the FIA World Touring Car Championship under the 'BMW M Team Schnitzer' banner with two BMW M3 E30 GPA Touring Cars. Our drivers were Roberto Ravaglia, Emanuelle Pirro, Roland Ratzenberger and Markus Oestreich. It really is a special track, and thinking back like this reminds me how long I have been doing this job!“

In Hockenheim Andy Priaulx won race one, Jörg Müller race two and the only non-BMW driver on the two podiums was SEAT’s Jordi Gené. However, with success comes weight in the form of ballast. In Brno Jörg Müller and Dirk Müller will carry 40 kilos each. The Brno track is not the best place to carry ballast as it goes downhill for about two and a half kilometres before rising steeply to the start/finish line. It will be important to have good acceleration up this hill, so not to lose out to the cars with no ballast.

The points’ situation now has BMW on 116 from Alfa Romeo on 85 and SEAT on 29. The Drivers’ Championship is closer as Jörg Müller has 50 points, Dirk Müller 48, Gabriele Tarquini, who will carry ten kilos of ballast in Brno, 43, Andy Priaulx 41, Fabrizio Gaiovanardi 33 and Augusto Farfus Jr 24. Tom Coronel has 58 points in the Independents’ battle from fellow BMW 320i driver, Stefano D’Aste, on 43 and Salvatore Tavano on 37. BMW Team Deutschland has 99 points, Autodelta Squadra Corse 81 and RBM, that runs both BMW Team Great Britain and BMW Team Belgium Luxembourg, 43.

The on track action starts on Saturday and the schedule for the FIA ETCC is as follows:
Saturday, 15 May 09.00 – 09.30 – Free Practice 1
12.40 – 13.10 – Free Practice 2
15.45 – 16.15 – Qualifying
Sunday, 16 May 09.30 – 09.45 – Warm Up
14.45 – Race 1 – 10 laps (54km)
15.45 – Race 2 – 10 laps (54km)

31-05-2004

The Perfect Weekend in Brno

It is like a dream come true. I won race one and came second in race two and now I am second in the championship, just four points behind Dirk Müller. I don’t want to sound boring, but this is just what I said I had to do, come away from Brno with two good results.

I still have a smile on my face and I don’t expect this will come off for quite a few days. I also don’t expect we will be able to get the smell of champagne out of our motorhome for quite a few days either. This is not because we have drunk a lot, but because after two visits to the podium I was completely saturated with the bubbly. Anyone who has ever smelt hot overalls that have been sprayed with champagne will know it is a smell that hangs around and, sadly for my family, is not that pleasant.

Anyway before the podium antics I had some hard work to do. Race one may have looked as though it was a breeze, but it was not. I didn’t make the perfect start I wanted and so had to really fight for the lead into the first corner. I then had a knock, which damaged my right rear and this gave me some cause for concern. Anyway I was able to build up my lead and forgot about what was happening behind me. I was just hoping that my main opposition in the championship was suffering and it was great news at the end of the ten laps to find out that Gabriele Tarquini had not scored a single point. While I don’t wish bad luck on my fellow BMW drivers, it also helped my cause that Jörg Müller’s weekend was not improving and he only took two points for seventh.

Race two was a very different story as I was eighth on the grid and ahead of me was some stiff opposition. There were both Dirk and Jörg and I knew that 40 kilos of weight was not going to slow them down that much. I was right. Dirk went on to win the race and it was a power steering problem that dropped Jörg back. I also had the Alfa Romeo of Fabrizio Giovanardi to get by and he did not prove easy. It was a fair fight with him, but if I had got by him a little sooner I may just have been able to get by Dirk, although he did drive brilliantly all weekend. Anyway it is no good dwelling on what may have been as I really enjoyed the race and before the start felt really pumped up as I knew I needed a big points finish.

I got the feeling after the races that everybody at BMW was delighted with the performance of all the drivers. It is important that we do well for the marque as well as for our individual teams. I know the F1 boys were having a far from happy time in Germany so I hope we have given everyone at BMW Motorsport something to smile about.

At the end of the two races we all went off to the press conference as usual but I got a rather unusual request to mention the title of an ABBA song, The Name of the Game, in the press conference. I was happy to oblige and have been assured that by the end of the season I will have a full explanation of this, although I may be asked to make further song title mentions during the rest of the year. I just hope that the next title is not Dancing Queen!

I now go to my home race at Donington with the full forty kilos ballast. Dirk will have the same while Jörg and Antonio will only have ten each. It will be a challenge but one I am happy to accept.