On the first weekend of August the AvD Historic Race Cup, jointly organized by the Historic Racecar Association (HRA) from Germany and FFR-FOR from Belgium, celebrated historic formula racing. They did so with three packed starting grids at SUPERSPA, on the spectacular Formula 1 track of Spa-Francorchamps.
In Race 1 on Sunday morning Stephan Lechine (#189) and Valerio Leone (#80) in their F3s (GO1) dominated the field, closely followed by Marvin Brandl (#26) and Jochen Thissen (#28) in their Formula Opels, crossing the line as 3rd and 4th respectively. Elio Cocciarelli (#1) was the best in the GO2 (F3 Pre-1985) class , after struggling with his clutch for much of the race. Onno Zuidema (#69) was the fastest FF 2000, ending the race as 7th overall, while Stefan Kramer (#10) won GO3, crossing the finish line as 10th. In the Sports 2000 (GO6) class Roberto Cocciarelli (#601) was the winner while Winfried Kornmeyer (#222) won the GO7 class.
In Race 2 the HRA GO1, GO2, GO5 and GO7 were joined by the FF Zetec and FF 1600 from the FFR-FOR. After Valerio Leone (#80) dropped out of the race due to ignition problems, Stephan Lechine (#189) had to slog it out with Dirk Kornmeyer (#222) and Elio Cocciarelli (#1) in their pre-85 F3s. In the GO5 and GO7 classes, Toni Krumbach (#555)) and Winfried Kornmeyer #2), as solo starters, had no competition. The FF1600 class though was heavily contested with 15 cars on the grid. David McArthur (#15) won this class, closely followed by Pascal Monbarron (#96) and John Svensson (#135), while Christophe Hansoul (#21) was unbeatable in the FF Zetec class.
In Race 3 the FF 1600, FF 2000, FF Zetec and Formula Opels from the FFR-FOR shared the track with the HRA GO3 (FF 2000), GO5 (FF1600) and GO6 (Sports 2000). After leading the race in his Formula Opel from the start, David Schneider (#129) dropped out of the race after 4 laps. This left Jochen Thissen (#28), Alan Williamson (#60) and Marvin Brandl (#26) to compete for the podium. Behind the trio, Henk van der Spoel (#69) and Stefan Kramer (#333) fought for a long time for 4th and 5th place, with Van der Spoel ultimately beating Kramer and winning the FF 2000 class. Cristophe Hansoul (# 21) and Thomas McArthur (#17) crossed the finish line in sixth and seventh place, winning the FF Zetec and FF 1600 classes respectively. The race between Roberto Cocciarelli (#601) and Harald Schmeyer (#692) competed till the very end in the GO6 class, with Cocciarelli having a lead of only 0,441 seconds when they crossed the line. In the GO5 class it was Toni Krumbach (#555) who took the laurels.
“The Spa-Francorchamps circuit is very popular with racing drivers, which is why we had the biggest number of AvD Historic Race Cup participants since quite a while,” says FFR-FOR series coordinator Wilco Ibes. “With 41 FFR-FOR entries and 33 from the HRA we booked 3 races and split up our series in such a way that all drivers could compete twice.” HRA series coordinator Marcel Biehl agrees: “Spa is simply a track that every motorsport enthusiast likes and where everyone loves to race.”
The HRA and FFR-FOR drivers now have a few weeks off before the last two events of the season. From 30 September to 2 October the AvD Historic Race Cup will participate in the ADAC Racing Weekend at Hockenheim, followed two weeks later by the Westfalen Trophy at the Nürburgring.