Thursday, December 5 was the run of the “Summer Down Under” GT Challenge held at the Mt Panorama Circuit (Bathurst). More commonly associated with Australian V8 race series this circuit provided a novel racing venue of which many were familiar with by name, but perhaps a bit fewer had familiarity in a racing sense-it made for quite race as we shall see.



After weeks of practice the near evenly split field of GT1 (so numerous in Astons it could have been renamed “Spec DBR9”) and GT2 got down to the business of qualifying. Frank Sumfleth in the KroMo DBR9 got it right and took pole with a 2:03.600 followed by Manuel Samaniego in a similar car just a few tenths back. Making an Aston Martin romp of qualifying was Terry McMahon in the AMR Tango DBR9 with a 2:06.250. But the eye catching news was the time set by the car in sixth spot-Marcel Lehrieder’s 997 putting the cat amongst the chickens by setting a 2:06.612-an astounding pace by a GT2 car (rumors circulated in the paddock of Marcel being offered keys to one of the DBR9’s and setting a 1:59.xx in a closed session). Andre Kroenert underscored the 997s agility at this track by taking second spot in GT2 with Eric Klister in the Crawling Gecko Racing Porsche making it a Stuttgart sweep of the top three qualifying spots.



Beautiful weather heralded a perfect day for 75 minutes of racing at this premier circuit. Unfortunately many best laid plans were put to rest as an incident at turn 1 sent many reaching for their crutches and walkers for a limp back to the pits-resulting in a DNF for the Hamilton Panoz and lap one pitstops for the Astons of J. Hamilton, Sumfleth and the Corvettes of LaBelle and Goncalves (sadly the rapid Porsche of Kroenert also retired on lap one due to equipment failure). Emerging from the chaos was the DBR9 of Samaniego followed by the GT2 car (!!) of Lehrieder in P2 and the DBR9 of McMahon in P3. For the next few laps it continued this way-Samaniego resetting fastest lap on each successive lap, yet not quite ‘running and hiding’ from the Porsche of Lehrieder and the DBR9 of McMahon. On lap 4 the DBR9 of McMahon overtook Lehrieder for P2. Sadly the Porsche driver made an error on the succeeding lap which led a lengthy pitstop for repairs promoting the Porsche of Klister to P3. Lap 5 saw the demise of another Porsche driver as the Mountjoy 997 had an accident and retired. On lap 6 the DBR9 of Sumfleth (having pitted on lap 1) served notice of his intentions and reset fast lap by over half a second with a 2:04.624 which would hold til the race’s end. It was on this lap the Corvette of Goncalves was attributed a DNF-reducing the field to 75% from the start.




For several laps it remained steady at the top-Samaniego, McMahon and Klister, with Samaniego maintaining an 18+ second lead over 2nd til McMahon pitted on lap 11 for damage repair. Sadly the DBR9 would succumb to engine failure shortly thereafter. This yielded 2nd to Klister and 3rd to the Spyker of Dalton. A bevy of pitstops over the next few laps with the DBR9 of Knowles pitting lap 14 and Samaniego, Sharkus in the 997 and Torres in the Ferrari pitting on lap 15. Midrace would see more victims from accident damage as the Porsche of Trapp and the Ferrari of Torres would fall victim of the challenging mountain section. Thus at mid race the field had been reduced 50%.

More pitstops past the midway point for the Corvette of LaBelle, Hamilton and Klister-with P2 falling to Dalton as a result and Sumfleth assuming P3. LaBelle’s race would end at this point due to a technical error-an unfortunate end to a solid run. Another fine drive which met its demise was the Spyker of Troy Dalton with the car brushing a wall, and the resulting damage leading to an off into the heavy gravel and retirement. This would promote Sumfleth to P2-an outstanding achievement for the driver after the lap one incident. Promoted to P3 was the DBR9 of Gomez having run a fine race as well.



A steady race for all in the latter third with a few pit stops and no position changes-but the drama had not ended yet. Having spun off track at “The Chase” the DBR9 of Gomez attempted to rejoin track directly in front of the Porsche of Klister. The 997 driver had nowhere to go and this resulted in a massive collision. Klister hobbled back to the pits, and retired as well as Gomez. A sad, sad end for two fine drives. And this reduced the field to six cars total-nearly 25% of the starting grid.




Fortunately things remained quiet til the end with Samaniego finishing in P1 with a 15 second lead over Sumfleth in P2, the latter driver having had an amazing comeback from lap 1. Rounding out a DBR9 1-2-3 was the Team HMI car of J. Hamilton-a lap down but showing great pace having set a fastest lap better than his qualifying time. First and only finisher in GT2 was the Drunken Squirrel car of Sharkus with a solid run til the end.




Full Race Results
rFactor: mount panorama, 12/15/2011 5:45:23 PM

Replay from Race
http://www.cmsracing.com/storage/spe...norama%202.Vcr