2007
Joaquin wins first Race of the Season
Joaquin Folch wins the first race of the season. Despite the training session at Mugello two weeks ago, Joaquin was unable to dominate
the weekend the way we all would have liked. Hampered by a sore back, Joaquin was able to lead after the first qualifiying but had to handover the pole to Peter Sowerby racing in Fredy's old Williams FW07. Unfortunately, Peter's engine died and with no spare engine available he had to depart Mugello without a race. A pity, we all would have liked to see a good race between Peter and Joaquin. So Joquin won with quite some back pain, but well a head of Kubota (in a Lotus 88) and Steve Hartly.
Christian wins at Hockenheim
The Jim Clark Revival aims to fill the top spot among the historic motorsport meetings and they are doing a good job... especially if the weather is so sunny and warm! Snow flakes last year and sun burn this year... anyway for Team Kumschick Racing it was two cars, two drivers and two podium finishers. After qualifying 1 & 2 we had Christian on pole position closely tracked by Peter Sowerby and Joaquin. So we had a great setup for an interesting race.... and that it was. Joaquin stormed ahead passed Peter and Christian to lead the race after the first lap, but unfortunatly for not much longer. Under intense pressure from Christian and Peter, Joaquin lost his pace and was passed by 5 drivers. With Christian in the lead, but under constant pressure from Peter and Joaquin slowling fighting back to third, Team Kumschick couldn't complain about too little action. So all in all it was another great race-meeting with great weather, 1 & 3 on the podium and a cheerful atmosphere.... what else can you ask for?
Fredy Goes Racing Again
After a two year break from racing Fredy Kumschick will restart his racer career in 2007. After many years (and titles) racing open wheel race cars, we will see Fredy in a Spice IMSA GTP competing for glory in the Historic Group C / GTP Racing Series. Fredy racing with a roof over his helmet? Well for all those who can't believe this.... visit us at the races and you will have a chance to see Fredy mastering a car that has 1.5 times the power over his old Williams as well as 1.5 times the weight. It's gonna be an exicting 2007. Have fun... we certainly will!
GP Live -- Joaquin wins again .... TWICE!!
By Oliver McCruden
Rounds 3 & 4 of the FIA Historic Formula One Championship had a bit of everything: superb racing throughout the strong field, changeable conditions, enthusiastic crowds, first-time outings of HFO cars, big screen live action (which broadcast the causes and effects of spills) and, ultimately, Joaquin Folch’s Brabham BT49 claiming victory in both races.
QualifyingQualifying well for rounds 3 & 4 of the FIA Historic Formula One Championship was always going to be vital at Donington’s GPLive double-header event on Saturday. Drivers had just one 30-minute session, which would set the grid for both the sprint race AND the feature race on the Sunday, and focus would be imperative. With twenty minutes run of the half-hour session, drivers were just getting up to speed and with several of the front runners sat in the pits changing onto fresh tyres for their hot laps. Of the potential front runners, Dean Lanzante in the beautiful McLaren MP4-1C/7 was on track and, with a relatively clear track, was going for it. After setting the second quickest time so far on what was a somewhat ragged lap, he pushed on for one more shot. Exiting the old hairpin right-hander, the McLaren ran slightly wide and onto the rumble strips. As Lanzante got back on the power, the rear end snapped away, pitching the car around, back across the track and onto the grass where the car picked up speed before slamming backwards into the tyre wall, ripping of the nearside rear wheel before coming to a standstill.
The incident brought the session to a halt as Lanzante was carted to the medical centre and when the stewards ruled that it would not be restarted, it was Peter Sowerby’s Williams FW07 which was left on pole with the top 7 drivers separated by just under a second but all united in disappointment that their qualifying times which would decide the grid for the two races, were not optimum.
Shaken but unhurt in the medical centre, Lanzante was coming to terms with the incident, phased more by the potential cost of the repairs to his client, Aaron Hsu’s car than the 100mph+ impact. His mood wasn’t helped by the disclosure that the whole incident had brought the session to an end and worse stills, that it had been broadcast to the paddock on the largest LED screen in Europe!
Saturday’s Race - Round 3
With Lanzante out of the picture, Sowerby looked comfortable on pole with the impressive Katsu Kubota promoted to second. Behind them, the usual suspects – Hubertus Bahlsen, Steve Hartley, Richard Eyre and Joaquin Folch were joined by Aaron Hsu in the MP4-1C/7 and the Tyrrell 011 of John Wilson, winner here in 2005. But despite the entire grid being made up from potential points-scorers, the big player was to be the weather during the 12-lap sprint race on the Saturday.
It was Bahlsen who once again that made the best start putting both Sowerby and Folch behind him as the lights changed. Hsu pulled off after just a few corners after what he could only admit to as “a terrible display of driving” as Wilson fought to keep Hartley at bay with Kubota and Richard Eyre, who appears revitalised after working on the set up of his Williams in recent months, just behind. Folch pursued Bahlsen for several laps before finally getting past under braking coming into the chicane, one of the few passing spots on the circuit.
As Folch pulled out a short lead, Sowerby, again not getting the best start, began to reel in Bahlsen. The pair went wheel-to-wheel through Redgate at least twice in a n excellent display of hard but fair racing until finally the Englishman got past and soon began closing in on Folch. It wasn’t to last though. As light rain began to fall and Sowerby’s team began to quiver on the pit wall, the big screens revealed the Williams spinning out of position. By the time he regained the circuit, he was back in 9th and would ultimately finish 8th just behind a solid Dan Collins. The Wilson/Hartley battle was another to watch with Eyre close behind. Hartley came out on top ultimately, finishing third overall and winning another vital 10 points with the class victory. Mauro Pane’s class B efforts are still going strong and the Italian looks to have a good claim to be an overall title contender after finishing 6th overall and collecting the class honours whilst John Delane, robbed of competition and full complement of points by the withdrawal of Ean Pugh’s Brabham BT34 just before the event, scooped class A again. But it was Folch that won overall, with Bahlsen six seconds behind. The results saw both Steve Allen and Patrick D’Aubreby score their first points of the season.
Sunday Race – Round 4
With no adverse weather to contend with for the 23 lap feature race on Sunday, it turned out to be just Joaquin Folch that needed to be dealt with carefully following his win the previous day. As the red lights went out, Sowerby got bogged down and, as first Kubota then Bahlsen came past, the Williams left the track onto the grass. As the crews and crowd watched on the big screen, Sowerby regained the track just as Folch came across him. The two cars touched wheels, Folch getting off lightly and continuing whilst Sowerby, suspension broken, once again hit the grass before limping round to the pits and retiring. Folch’s drama continued however. Having left a stricken Sowerby behind him, he continued his charge to the first corner where, trying a move up the inside of Bahlsen connected with the Swiss driver. Both cars span – Bahlsen to the left and onto the gravel and Folch right onto the grass. John Wilson, with nowhere to go, was forced to hit Bahlsen with both cars coming to a rest buried in the gravel trap and joined by Dave Abbott. The latter was able to get a push start and tour around to join up with the grid, which was now stopped again under a red flag on the grid. Folch was also fortunate; he skilfully kept the engine running and got off the grass before returning to the grid. A cursory check of the car by the Kumschick Racing team revealed no damage and, with race distance reduced to 21 laps, was able to make the restart.
The chaos meant that Kubota was in A1 position and that three other contenders were out of the running. As the lights changed, the Japanese driver made the perfect getaway, opening up over a second’s gap from Folch in the first two laps. Slowly though, the Brabham of the later closed and, on lap 8, took the lead. The pair began to drive away from Eyre in third place until lap 10 when the DFV on the Lotus 88B let go in spectacular fashion promoting Eyre to second and clearing the way for him to set the fastest lap in the process.
One driver in particular that was showing strong was Hsu. Following his disappointing race on Saturday, the American was driving excellently and, still relatively new to the car, was able to fight past Hartley to claim the class D win and close to within under half a second from Eyre by the finish. Behind Hartley, the two Lotus’ of Collins and Nico Bindels finished neck and neck having bettered the 6 wheeled Tyrrell of Pane. Abbott made good of his fortune to get out of the initial first corner incident to claim eighth. Rodrigo Gallego put his Minardi ninth with Abba Kogan’s Williams FW06 just over a second behind. Peter Wunsch & Patrick D’Aubreby finished a lap down on the leaders with Andrea Bahlsen, John Delane and Terry Sayles one lap back.
The next round is at the Nurburgring on June 20th.
Fredy Returns with a Vengeance
Two years of race retirement didn't stop "Fast Fredy" in the Spice SE90GTP. He is back with a vengeance: 2nd in the first race and 3rd in the second 40min race.
Within 9 weeks, Fredy and his mechanics brought the AUTO TOY STORE Spice back to victory lane. After a quick shake down during the first practice session we all new that we got a powerful package with Fredy and the Spice. With only one timed lap on the book Fredy finished on P4 for the training session. Qualifying was typical Kumschick Racing style, but this time not by the Brabhams of Folch and Gläsel, but by Fredy himself.... P2 and first row! Wow what a start!
We all started Race 1 with wet feet and soaked sweaters. Nürburg Ring weather at it's best. 10 Minutes before the race heaven's gates opened and wet tyres were in fashion. However, it didn't took long before the sun was breaking through again. So with black sky to the right and sun to left we had to think about intermediates. Well the race was started with field of GroupC/GTP cars on wets. Sure enough, a spin from Fredy and 3 laps later the track started to get dry. Would the wets hold up for the remaining 20 minutes? Yes the tires did as well as Fredy. First podium for the AUTO TOY STORE Spice and second place for Fredy after a two year "race vacation". Happy about the result and the car we knew that we could expect quite a bit from Sunday's race.
Race 2 started in bright sunshine an all of us knew that it will be difficult to beat the FAT Joest Porsche 962. So nodoby was surprised when the Porsche pulled away followed by Mercer in his Cosi Spice and Junstin Law in the Jaguar, but Team Kumschick Racing was very surprised to hear misfire and sputtering from our Spice's Chevy engine. Changing mixture didn't change a thing so Fredy played it safe and lowered the redline to 6000 RPM. With Justin out and Pearson in his Nissan under control Fredy managed to secure the third spot on the podium.
Check out the pictures in the Picture Gallery.
Fredy finishes second at Le Mans
Ok we all know that Fredy is fast, but how fast is he when the engine develops full power? Still strangled by engine problems (cut outs) during test sessions and qualifying the team decided to gear the Spice to accomodate for a strangled engine with max 6000rpm. First race was like expected. Fredy was able to keep up the pace for about 10 minutes before the engine started to cut out again above 6000 RPM. Thanks to the regearing Fredy was able to secure P4. Good but not podium so the team knew that the problem needed to be solved soon -- no matter what. After wading through ecu manuals, wire diagrams and sensor spec sheets we started to measure the wire tree -- wire by wire. Based on logged sync errors we focused on the ref and sync sensors of the chevy engine. Ultimatrely we discovered that the sync sensor was no longer a hall type sensor but a mag type sensor that was still connected to the hall port on the ecu. Funny enough the engine run perfectly in the warmup after we changed that little detail!! Details -- motorsport is all about details!
The second race was labeled a wet race, so hopes were high that Fredy could do well in weather he likes and an engine that performs. Yes that's exactly the way it turned out. The FAT porsche took the lead but Fredy could keep up quite well until the overtaking started were he lost more than Sumptner in the Porsche. However, in the second part of the race the rain got lighter and Fredy got more agressive... leading to the fastest lap with over halve a second clearence to Sumptner's time. All in all it was a great weekend for us. We learned alot about the car and the engine management and we even had time to do some pit stop/tire change training. And YES Fredy ended up on the podium at Le Mans after a hard race! Let's go to Silverstone and kick some Porsche butts!
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Joachin Folch wins twice at Oldtimer-Grand Prix
Joaquin Folch had a quite sucessful race weekend at Nürburging. After a canceled training session at the Eifel track due to fog, Joaquin was granted the pole based on past performance. The following two races were nice and clean start to finish jobs. Twice on the podium on the top spot --- what can you ask for more?
Win number four for Sowerby, Gläsel 2nd, Folch 3rd
The penultimate round of this year’s FIA Historic Formula One Championship was part of the Kiki Bruyns organised RMU Classic at the newly re-developed Francochamps last weekend and proved dramatic on all fronts. Peter Sowerby took his fourth win of the year in the Colin Bennett run Williams and the pure consistency of Steve Hartley’s ’07 campaign resulted in his retention of the Championship title.
Two heavy shunts in practice saw Janine Payne seriously damage the Arrows A4 without injury although Richard Eyre’s lady was taken to Vervier’s hospital for a mandatory check-over. In the second session Peter Wuensch inflicted equally heavy damage on his Wolf having hit the oil liberally spread from Alain de Wagter’sA6. The same slick also claimed Abba Kogan’s Williams which sustained suspension damage.
The on-form Sowerby took an emphatic pole, nearly four seconds quicker than the Brabham of Christian Glaesel ahead of Hubertus Bahlsen’s Arrows and the Kumschick run BT49 of Joaquim Folch. New recruit Bobby Verdon-Roe was fifth fastest in his class B McLaren M26 alongside Nico Bindel’s rebuilt Lotus 87B. Championship title contenders Steve Hartley and Mauro Pane in the six-wheel Tyrell shared row 4 and with just two points difference in the overall standings, this was going to prove a decisive race with just one round remaining.
Whilst the first corner at Spa has been opened for a better shared line from the start there was a coming together as Pane cut inside Folch’s Brabham going into the tightening corner. The contact ended the Italian’s race and championship hopes, the front suspension being seriously deranged. Bahlsen had arrived at the corner ahead, gone wide and coming back onto line drove over the front wheel of Verdon-Roe’s M26. The Swiss Arrows coasted to a halt before La Source.
Sowerby’s race plan was to head Glaesel on the first lap and make the German’s Brabham fight from behind. Having already set the fastest race lap Sowerby had a 3.5 second advantage over the Brabham duo by lap four with Glaesel preparing to attack. One of the best duals featured Verdon-Roe, Hartley, Bindels and the twin-chassis Lotus 88 of Dan Collins. For four laps this group swapped places, the scrap ultimately resolved in favour of Hartley, followed by Verdon-Roe, Collins and Bindels.
From lap five Glaesel cut the gap to Sowerby to just one second going into lap ten. However the Lincolnshire house builder was not about to pass up win number four this season and led the German across the line with Folch third in Mr Eccleston’s BT49. Hartley took fourth overall and class fastest lap to secure his points and the retention of his 2006 Championship title. The Darwen engineer has benefited from a savvy racing philosophy this year and reliable preparation by Mirage Motorsport.
Frenchman Patrick D’Aubreby brought the Ecurie Griffiths Tyrell 012 home eighth ahead of Peter Dunn in his newly acquired Tony Smith Williams FW07. Dave Abbott recovered from a poor grid place to tenth ahead of the Minardi of Rodrigo Gallego.
Class positions still need to be resolved at the final race of the season at Dijon in late September.
by Oli McCrudden
Fredy on Fire.... this time not the way we like!
OK the race season is over...
Season 2007 is history and all efforts go into our 2008 projects. Rebuiding Daniel's Nissan Group C3 car, rebuilding our Spice or just plain vanila winter maintenance on our Brabhams, Maclaren or Williams F1 cars. We are all a bit tired after such a long season, but we think and talk about next season Monte Carlo with F1 and LeMans with a GTP car how much better can live be?! This brings me to a very sad story. For many weeks now, Steve Fosset is missing. If you read the next few paragraphs you will agree that one of the "last action heros" is missing. Sailing, gliders, airships, baloons, airplanes, racecars or triathlon, swimming the Channel, or climbing. This guy is special. Let's hope just did a detour to a mexican cantina or found the entrance to the center of the earth.....
On this... enjoy life and if you have time visit us at the garage for some "hangar flying"
cheers and all the best to all of you
Daniel
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