First Win For Prospeed Porsche in Portugal

Marco Holzer and Paul Van Splunteren took a historic first win in the FIA GT3 European Championship for themselves and their Prospeed Competition team.  Marco Holzer took the chequered flag in the Porsche 911 GT3 R at the end of the action packed 33-lap race 5.8 seconds ahead of championship leader Christian Hohenadel in the Callaway Competition Corvette Z06R who in turn finished 26 seconds ahead of his championship rival Mike Parisy in the Graff Racing Corvette.

At the start of the first 60-minute race of the weekend the Callaway Corvette of Daniel Keilwitz was mobbed at the start by the two Porsches of Paul van Splunteren and Gilles Vannelet (Mühlner Motorsport) with Vannelet taking the lead on the opening lap ahead of van Splunteren and Keilwitz.  At the first turn the United Autosports Audi of Zak Brown was an early casualty, spinning down the field and causing several following cars to take avoiding action.

On lap two Gilles Vannelet continued to hold the lead as van Splunteren came under pressure from the recovering Callaway Corvette.  For several laps the Prospeed Porsche kept the Corvette at bay and it wasn’t until lap 11 that Keilwitz finally made his move at Turn one to take second place.  Further back the 4th placed Chad Racing Ferrari of Giacomo Petrobelli was being tracked by the nr77 Need for Speed by Schubert Motorsport BMW Z4 of Csaba Walter and after several abortive attempts the Hungarian finally made his passing move stick at the first corner on lap 13.

On lap 14 the pit window opened and many of the cars decided to pit early as Vannelet and Keilwitz continued to circulate at the front of the field and by lap 17 the gap was down to just 0.4 seconds.  On lap 18 the Corvette pitted with Keilwitz handing over to Christian Hohenadel.  The German emerged from the pits just as the nr61 Prospeed Porsche flashed pass, to move back ahead of the Callaway Competition car.  On lap 19 Gilles Vannelet pitted from the lead to hand over to Niki Lanik but the Austrian emerged from the pits in 3rd place behind Holzer and Hohenadel.

While the two leaders pulled ahead, Lanik started to drop back into the clutches of the following cars, being passes by the nr77 BMW Z4 of Claudia Hürtgen for third and then the nr60 Prospeed Porsche, the nr16 Graff Racing Corvette and nr87 Chad Racing Ferrari.  A lap later Hürtgen came into the pits for a second time with a puncture, promoting Markus Paltalla in the nr60 Prospeed car into 3rd.  However he was soon demoted when Diego Alessi swept past Parisy’s Corvette and Paltalla’s Porsche in quick succession only to be given a drive through penalty for exceeding the track limits.

As Marco Holzer and Christian Hohenadel continued to circulate at the front the battle for third was hotting up with Mike Parisy eventually getting the better of his rivals after several laps of hard, but clean racing.

At the flag it was Marco Holzer who scored his first FIA GT3 European Championship win, with Christian Hohenadel moving ever closer to the 2010 drivers crown.  Mike Parisy finished in 3rd place to keep his, and Joakim Lambotte’s title challenge alive for another day.

CLICK HERE for result of Round 9

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