Photo:

Spa testing summary

By

In the afternoon session of the last day of testing at Spa-Francorchamps, the lap times were clearly improved. While Heinz-Harald Frentzen, the experienced Opel driver, had dominated the action from Tuesday to Thursday, Friday turned out to be the day of the young guns.

In the 68th of his 69 laps, Pierre Kaffer set a 2:13.689-minute lap, thus clinching the top position on the time sheets, in his Audi A4 DTM, with young Canadian Bruno Spengler (2:13.749 minutes) behind the wheel of his AMG-Mercedes C-Class being just fractions slower.

“I’m really happy,” said Kaffer who lives in Switzerland. “It feels just great to have been fastest, in DTM. Quite obviously I’m not sure how to assess this result, but for Audi Sport Team Joest, this has been a satisfying finish of the tests. During the four days of testing, we have been cooperating really well and we’ve continued to learn a lot about DTM.” Then, Kaffer underlined that his lap time must be taken seriously. “I really like Spa-Francorchamps and I’m looking forward to the race and even more to the qualifying, as it’s particularly great to drive the DTM car in its qualifying set-up, at Spa-Francorchamps. “

While the young guns battled it out for the fastest lap time, experienced Heinz-Harald Frentzen preferred to prepare for his appearance in the ‘Rally Monte Carlo Fuel Cell and Hybrid’, taking place tomorrow. In this rally for alternative engine concepts, the German will contest the two stages across the French Alps (total mileage: 410 kilometres) behind the wheel of an Opel Zafira fuel cell prototype HydroGen 3. While Frentzen’s brand-mates, Manuel Reuter, Marcel Fässler and Laurent Aiello, continued the testing work at Spa, with all the three mainly focusing on completing long-runs.

In addition to Kaffer and Spengler, who succeeded in securing the top positions on the time sheets, Audi works driver ‘Dindo’ Capello and the runner-up of the 2004 season, Gary Paffet (AMG-Mercedes C-Class’) also succeeded in beating the previously fastest lap time set by Heinz-Harald Frentzen, on Wednesday. “Yesterday and this morning, it was too wet for slicks and too dry for wets,” said the Briton. “But early in the afternoon, the track dried up, thus offering us the opportunity of setting fast lap times. We were able to set consistent times and are happy with the results of the tests.”

Bruno Spengler turned out to be the busiest driver, during the course of the four days of testing. Behind the wheel of the AMG-Mercedes C-Class, the young Canadian completed 228 laps, representing a total mileage of 1588.704 kilometres, with Opel works driver Marcel Fässler covering an only slightly smaller mileage (220 laps) and endurance sportsman Manuel Reuter lapping the 6.968-kilometre Ardennes rollercoaster 216 times.

Day Four

1 Pierre Kaffer Audi A4 2:13.689
2 Bruno Spengler Mercedes C-Class 2:13.749
3 Rinaldo Capello Audi A4 2:14.086
4 Gary Paffett Mercedes C-Class 2:14.260
5 Manuel Reuter Opel Vectra 2:14.943
6 Christian Abt Audi A4 2:14.948
7 Alex Margaritis Mercedes C-Class 2:15.069
8 Jamie Green Mercedes C-Class 2:15.137
9 Marcel Fässler Opel Vectra 2:15.488
10 Laurent Aiello Opel Vectra 2:15.496
11 Mika Häkkinen Mercedes C-Class 2:16.462
12 Heinz-Harald Frentzen Opel Vectra 2:17.490

Overall result

1 Pierre Kaffer Audi A4 2:13.689
2 Bruno Spengler Mercedes C-Class 2:13.749
3 Rinaldo Capello Audi A4 2:14.086
4 Gary Paffett Mercedes C-Class 2:14.260
5 Heinz-Harald Frentzen Opel Vectra 2:14.312
6 Jamie Green Mercedes C-Class 2:14.701
7 Jean Alesi Mercedes C-Class 2:14.721
8 Manuel Reuter Opel Vectra 2:14.943
9 Christian Abt Audi A4 2:14.948
10 Alex Margaritis Mercedes C-Class 2:15.069
11 Stefan Mücke Mercedes C-Class 2:15.148
12 Frank Stippler Audi A4 2:15.329
13 Allan McNish Audi A4 2:15.357
14 Laurent Aiello Opel Vectra 2:15.378
15 Bernd Schneider Mercedes C-Class 2:15.454
16 Marcel Fässler Opel Vectra 2:15.488
17 Mika Häkkinen Mercedes C-Class 2:16.462
18 Tom Kristensen Audi A4 2:17.720
19 Martin Tomczyk Audi A4 2:19.371
20 Mattias Ekström Audi A4 2:30.936