The finale of the GT3 World Tour 2023 – Winter Season took place on 28.04.2024 on the Magny Curs circuit. Or as Roland said: “Somewhere in the sticks of France”. Even though it was the last race, 28 riders took part. All well prepared, of course, and some riders certainly with high ambitions. It was a fabulous race, the likes of which we have never experienced before.
The quali was quite unspectacular. The drivers were able to spread out well on the course. Even if there was a bit of a traffic jam, space was left fairly to give the opponent the chance to do his fastest lap. In the end, Jan Schmid took pole position. Next to him in P2 was Yannick Pleiss and Jessy Monrose took P3. In the interview, he was quite surprised and wasn’t sure about his performance in the race, we’ll see. Yannick was aware of his position and you could already hear in his interview that he didn’t necessarily want to be beaten in second place, but that he wasn’t going to rush into anything. Jan, on the other hand, was happy that he could finally play at the front again with the M4.
Matthias also proved to be competitive again with his Aston and took fourth place ahead of Maximilian Dehn. Dehn was leading the drivers’ standings before the race. We can’t wait to see if he manages to take the crown. Everyone knows that he lost some points due to the missed races and that he has a good challenge to overcome at 60kg successful weight. The places behind them were taken by drivers Brock, Hering, Marquardt, Erstling and Phlipsen. All of them were strong opponents, some of whom had a say in the season’s crown.
All in all, it was clear that the first team and the VorteX armada were quite well prepared. The cars are well adapted to the demanding and confusing track, the braking points are clearly set and they also master the treacherous bends from the FF. But Maximilian and Jan also showed what they could do. Of course, we must not forget WuD either. Of the cars that started, the boys got two into the top 10. So it’s a fight to the last race and to the last point.
This time the start was like something out of a picture book. You could literally feel that all the riders wanted to complete this race as smoothly as possible. Some probably even relied on the time factor or the pit stop strategy. Maximilian, on the other hand, skillfully exploited his starting advantage with the Mercedes AMG and took second place directly in the first corner, probably the best start of the race. Yannick had to give way in the situation and ended up in third place. Jan was able to get the M4 off to a good start and demonstrated an excellent reaction time. Loris overtook Matthias at the start. An important move for him to finally score some points.
On the straight to the Adelaide hairpin bend it was already getting hot. Some of the riders were competing 4-wide in slipstream races and I admit I was pretty nervous on this approach, even as a spectator. The brakes were more or less still cold, the tires only halfway warmed up and 28 crazy people were hurtling at 250 km/h towards a bend that you only take in second gear at most. And yeah, nothing happened! Great show guys. First your heart sinks as you wonder if it will go well and then everyone sorts themselves into the field like real professionals!
Contact was avoided, but there were still some two or even three-way battles to be seen across the entire field. Michael Marquardt had to make the first sacrifice. On the second lap, he lost the car on the turf and dropped a few positions. Fortunately, he showed so much control and overview that no other driver was involved in this slip-up.
Jan pulled away a little in the first places. And then suddenly the tower signal “DNF” came after Maximilian Dehn’s name. I thought it was probably just a program error, but after studying the replay it was clear that it was having connection problems. I don’t know if it could have been any more exciting at this point. The season favorite is out due to technical problems. Can it get any worse? I wonder what Maximilian was thinking at this point. Perhaps he had initially hoped it was a server problem, until he realized that his Internet connection had been interrupted. I can imagine that one or two drivers would have raged in this situation 😊.
Robin Ricke, who unfortunately could not drive himself, was present in the stream chat and supported Hasso and Roland. He also immediately began to calculate who would win the championship with the current position. He also carried out the quick calculation of the team and driver standings throughout the race. Thank you for that!
It wasn’t too long before we heard from Maximilian what we had already suspected. A disconnect knocked him out of the race and therefore out of the championship title. He then wanted to go straight to the gym, I just hope he didn’t confuse it with the telecom store and move a chair or two there. 😉 Joking aside, it probably wasn’t the worst decision considering that he had already lost 4 or more rounds up to that point.
These major events marked the start of an exciting finale between newly mixed title contenders. Sensational duels over several corners with critical situations were fought in all positions of the grid. Of course, everyone always kept an eye on Yannick. He had now become the favorite for the title, but he also gave us some shock moments. Even an almost-champion is not safe from the last chicane. He proved this several times with great drifts at the exit of corners and excellent vehicle control afterwards when he caught the car again.
This last combination of bends was a tough one. The drivers had to drive hard over the curbs to be able to carry their speed into the first straight. It’s easy to overestimate and there is often only one result. At the exit of the chicane is a grandstand wall, which some drivers got to know better than they had hoped. These included names such as Thomas Batzke, Markus Smetaczek and Frank Phlipsen. All of them were fast and good riders who had a lot of trouble here and lost a few places as a result. Markus musste nach einem sehr harten Einschlag sogar den Wagen reparieren lassen. This is particularly annoying as you have just passed the pit lane at this point and therefore have to complete an entire lap with a damaged vehicle.
A sensational race continued to progress. The “wounded” Pleiss also had to assert himself several times against a really warmed-up Matthias Weber. Thank you for these hot fights! Great racing. Of course, there was also a fight further back. First and foremost I would like to mention Rene von Dobschuetz, who started from 13th place and gradually moved up to 2nd place, only being put back in his place by his late pit stop. In the end, he was able to claim 5th place. Great performance.
One of the drivers simply let it pass. Innocent as ever, he did his laps, one after the other, and we were already considering the first bets on whether he could pull it off this time. Of course I’m talking about Mr. Gambling! One of the last to visit the pits and that was obviously exactly the right strategy. Staying out for a long time, staying fast and what Andreas doesn’t find difficult – staying cool. This allowed him to extend his lead to such an extent that even his pit stop didn’t wash him back, and that until the end of the race. Yes, he’s back, competitive and in the car he knows better than almost anyone else. First place was the result of this race for him! Congratulations Andi!
In the end, Yannick managed to put his leaden Porsche in second place and took the championship title. Congratulations Yannick! After several years, it finally worked! Loris Brock took third place in this race and thus some important points for him to overtake Daniel Erstling in the standings. This also secured him third place in the championship. Daniel Erstling finished just one point behind, in fourth place in the championship, and the evening’s unluckiest driver was able to retain fifth place in the championship thanks to his fabulous performance in the run-up to the race. This season’s performance also deserves a big round of applause.
The entire field of drivers also deserves a big round of applause for a season finale that was ultimately able to take place without any intervention from the race committee!
And? By the way, who actually finished runner-up? We can include Markus Krüger here. The “winter season only” rider proved his skills several times and ultimately collected so many points that it was enough for second place in the championship standings! Clean performance!
I’ll say goodbye for this season with a few impressions of the last race and of course the stream link. Many thanks to all the drivers who took part. You have made a great series even better! Thank you also for the great conversations before, after and between the races and the many breathtaking duels you presented. That’s the lifeblood of this series, we’re already looking forward to seeing you all again soon! Many thanks to Roland and Friends for the entertaining live broadcasts, which hardly missed a single slip-up from Matthias 😉 and yet captured all the other important events! I’m looking forward to tuning in again and following the next races closely! The next season will start at the beginning of June, we will of course keep you up to date via Discord, forum and homepage! See you soon!
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