Sunny start to Day 2 of Bumod GP
After rain dampened the opening day of the Bumod Grand Prix, competitors woke up this morning to glorious sunshine for the second official practice day here in Bursa, Turkey. With two 30 minute sessions under their belts the drivers can now get down to some productive testing. In 1:10, Dutch international electric touring car star Jilles Groskamp is setting the early pace with his prototype Serpent 7XX running as he predicted last night some 19 second laps. The 2008 Worlds Top Qualifier, who said traction is still quite low, has started to play around with different set-ups with the car responding positively to the changes.
During one of his runs Groskamp had a good battle with the Xray of Surikarn C., a man he is more used to mixing it with in electric Touring Cars. Surikarn has spent the morning trying different tyre compounds and is now focusing on getting more steering on his NT1. Fellow Xray driver Dirk Wischnewski found a softer tyre more to his liking this morning but he hasn’t changed his set-up yet preferring to wait for the traction to come up before making any adjustments. High temperatures appear to be Austrian Gerhard Kandelhardt’s biggest concern which he said could make it difficult to make 5 minutes. The format here this weekend will see qualifying run IFMAR style meaning 10 minute heats. Having run his Max practice engine in the two 30 minute sessions this morning ‘Kandi’ will now switch to his ORCAN Novarossi.
DJ Apolaro, who is racing outside of the US for the very first time, is competing in both 1:10 and 1:8 but has found both his cars are geared too short. The Serpent America team driver is used to super high traction back home and is spinning up tyres out of the corners here. Unfortunately Apolaro’s shipment of tyres for the race have been seized by local customs and despite many phone calls will not be released until Monday!! For Michael Salven the morning went off without any major drama and he is pleased with his 966. The German plans to focus on engines for the next session with run time set to be a big factor come qualifying tomorrow.
Robert Pietsch is finding it not so easy to tune his factory Novarossi engines this morning due to the high oil content of the fuel provided by the race organisers. The German National Champion plans to try a second engine and will also switch to a softer rear anti roll bar on his Mugen. Pietsch said the high speed layout of the track makes it critical to get a good set-up because if the back is sliding you can loss a lot of time as the car scrubs off speed.
Factory Shepherd driver Patrick Shaefer said his Velox is feeling quite good but he was running too short a gearing. The German is a little concerned about tyre wear which he said is pretty high and he hopes he has enough sets of Ennetis to see him through the rest of the event. Fast female Sabrina Lechner is pleased with her Serpent 966 but is going to adjust the shims on the head of her Max which is running inconsistent.
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