With exciting battles, spectacular crashes and dramatic weather changes, the 12H Mugello endurance race took place in Italy on Saturday and Sunday. Latvia’s leading highway driver Valters Zviedris together with the Lithuanian-Italian team “Rimo Adero by Ebimotors” won the second place in the “992 / AM” competition, while finishing in the high 4th place among all the teams starting with the “Porsche 911 GT3 CUP”. The victory was absolutely won by the Dutch “Team GP Elite” team with “Porsche 911 GT3 R”.
In the first stage of the “24H Series” championship, which took place on the legendary Mugello track, 36 teams participated, in which more than 130 pilots from 20 different countries competed. We already reported that in Friday’s qualifying, Valters Zviedris showed a faster lap time than WRC legend Sebastien Loeb and, together with his teammates Aurelius Rusteik, Mantas Janavičas and Marius Bartkas, won the second place in his “992 / AM” in the 12-team competition. In Saturday’s competition, the team respectively started from the 19th place overall and as the sixth out of 16 “992” class teams. It should be noted that the “GT3” class cars fought for the absolute victory, which are about five seconds faster than the “992” class “Porsche 911 GT3 CUP” on this Mugello track.
Photo: Ebimotors
At the beginning of “12H Mugello” Aurelijs Rusteika sat at the wheel, who managed to avoid several collisions around him during the chaotic start, in which several cars were damaged, among them two other Lithuanian teams. After about an hour, Janavičius took over the reins of the steering wheel, who had taken the team to the top three in his ranking in two hours with a very good speed. During the next pilot change, the Swede sat at the wheel, who continued the course he started and got closer and closer to the leaders of the “992 / AM” standings, showing the fastest lap times in the class.
Bartkus went further on the track, who managed to keep the team in the first three, while shortly before the end of the first day, the experienced team engineers decided to make a tactical pit visit and a pilot change in order to put themselves in a better position for the second day of the competition. Thus, after the first part, which lasted 6.5 hours, the “Rimo Adero by Ebimotors” team was in 4th place in their classification, however with newer tires and a fuller fuel tank than the competitors right there in front. It should be noted that after the finish of the first day, the cars were placed in the closed park, so the teams could not touch them and the second part was started by the same pilots who finished the first.
On Sunday morning, respectively, Janavičius was the first on the track, followed by Bartkus, while Zviedris was the third on the track. It should be noted that with fast and stable driving, as well as a good strategy, the team managed to rise to the first place in the standings and be the third among all vehicles of the “992” class. Shortly after the Latvian pilot got behind the wheel, it started to rain for the first time all weekend, which made driving on the fast track significantly more difficult.
”The ride was quite chaotic as it rained for the first time this weekend. It was still manageable during my first hour of driving as the rain wasn’t heavy and not in the fast turns. Then, just after we had put new dry weather tires on, the rain got heavier and heavier and it became very difficult to drive with those tires. However, even in these slippery conditions, I maintained good lap times, kept the high positions and was probably one of the last to enter the pits with dry weather tires,” she says about her second day’s drive Walter the Swede.
After changing the tires, Janavičius went on the “bad” rain on the now completely wet track, who managed to show solid lap times in the difficult conditions. However, in these chaotic conditions, when the weather conditions changed rapidly and there were several “Code60” periods due to accidents (the track is allowed to drive at a maximum of 60 km/h), the nearest competitors of the “992 / AM” qualifying managed to use the strategy to their advantage more successfully and pass the Swede for the represented team. In the remaining hour and a half, it was not possible to recover what was lost in the pits, so in the end, the 992 / AM finished in 2nd place in the standings, 4th among all Porsche 911 GT3 CUP cars and 11th overall, leaving behind several much faster cars.
“Even though the end itself was a bit unsuccessful, the whole team is happy with the second place in our debut competition. For all four of us, this was the first time in this championship and on this track, so the result is really very good. With each trip we felt more and more confident on the track and we also worked very successfully both with each other and with the Italian “Ebimotors” team. Unfortunately, we were a little unlucky in the end, because we fought for the victory of the “992 / AM” for most of the race, and we were also among the fastest “Porsche 911 GT3 CUP” on the track. We can be proud of the fact that we were able to be so close to such legends as Löb and Duma, before the competition, no one expected anything like that,” the Latvian racing driver is happy about the completed competition. In conclusion, the Swede mentions that “I enjoyed every second at the fantastic Porsche 911 GT3 CUP” steering wheel and this endurance race, of course, was also a very good training for me for the sprint competition season, about the plans of which we will be able to tell you more soon”. You can watch the recording of the recently held “12H Mugello” race on the “24H Series” Youtube page – Part 1 and Part 2. You can get acquainted with the full results of the competition HERE.
Information prepared by:
Arthur Virbulis
