One day in the ADAC Cruze Cup

TouringCarTimes International Superstars Series Editor Pietro Casillo had a taste of the ADAC Cruze Cup courtesy of Chevrolet last week. Pietro tells us about his eventful day with the team.

When I was offered to live a race as a works driver, I was more than happy as you can imagine. Chevrolet Europe and Wiechers Sport let me take part in a race of the ADAC Cruze Cup at the Lausitzring.

I had raced before as a privateer, but racing in a works car is quite different. The ADAC Cruze Cup is a very competitive series, although everyone is very friendly and it all feels like a big family.

I knew my job was to place the car as high as possible on track. The team was Maurer Motorsport, a former World Touring Car Championship independent team and they’re also building the new Lexus for the Superstars Series. I knew I was going to be with a very professional team, and I was going to work with people used to high profile racing in motorsport.

The whole event was to be held on Monday 20th June, and the schedule was very busy. The races in the ADAC Cruze Cup last 4 hours, so I had a partner, which was Martin Westerhoff, a fellow journalist. When we got to the track on Monday morning we went straight for a track walk. None of the other teams did that. Of course, walking through the track gives you a different vision of the whole road and helps the drivers to fully understand the ideal lines and braking points. That is what we discussed with our engineer Oliver and our team-mates Maja and Gilbert, trying to gather as much information as possible to be ready for free practice.

It was explained to me that the track walk is a routine process in works teams, to help the drivers to familiarize themselves with the track. That happens particularly on a new track, as was for us the Lausitzring.

After a quick seat fitting (the Cruze Cup has an adjustable seat to allow the different drivers to be comfortable in the car), we were instructed about the behaviour of the car. The Cruze is a heavy and powerful car. This year all cars have been updated with bigger front brakes, which makes it easier to lock the front under braking but slows the car down very effectively, as long as the driver is able to modulate the pressure on the pedal.

So we had the ideal lines, we were told how the car would react to our inputs: it was time to go out on track. I was the first to go out in Free Practice, which lasts one hour in the Cruze Cup. I took the time to get some heat in the tyres as they have a hard compound (they have to last for four hours!), then I started pushing.

The Chevrolet Cruze is a great car. The 140bhp engine pushes the car to high speeds and delivers the power smoothly enough to make it very drivable and therefore enjoyable. A very good handling and a great set-up meant I could place the car exactly where I wanted it to go, the steering was very precise and the car didn’t understeer much, especially on cold tyres.

At the end of my run I was ninth but I hadn’t pushed to my limit. I knew we were still in free practice and I just had to bring the car back to the pits in one piece. I hadn’t been too slow though, and the team were happy with my performance. We discussed the minor issues I had and decided we would wait for my team mate to do his run before deciding any set-up changes. It was great to see that as soon as the car got to the pits the whole team crew was around to check if everything was fine. Being in a works team also means being sure that the car is always 100% at anytime during the event.

Bad luck came when Martin hit a kerb and damaged the gearbox, which we couldn’t fix in time for him to do any more laps. The problem persisted in qualifying, which meant Martin had to do the whole session without using third and fifth gear, which was a great problem because nearly all the corners of the Lausitzring are third gear corners.

The team didn’t give up and tried to fix the gearbox in time for the race. We narrowly missed the pitlane closing time, but nothing changed because we were to start last anyway. I went out for the race start and the gearbox seemed fine on the warm-up lap. Unfortunately as soon as I started and I put the third gear in, it just didn’t work, the car was in neutral. I tried to do a couple of laps like that but then decided to go back to the pits to see if the car could be fixed. We were too slow to be able to match anyones pace, so we thought it would have been better to just try to fix the car and drive it properly.

The result was that I could see exactly how an official team works. As soon as I got to the pits the whole crew was around, trying to figure out how to help. It didn’t really matter that we were obviously out of any contention, their job was to fix the car and send it out on track again and that’s what they worked for. They tried different solutions and never gave up. Many members of the crew didn’t even have lunch because they had to fix that gearbox. That’s what a works team has to do.

So, what does a works driver have to do? In that specific case, he just has to wait! When I went out on track to see if their work had paid off I had to provide detailed and precise feedback. On one of these runs I was hit from behind by someone who was going to lap me, and after that we decided we’d better quit trying to go out every ten minutes and try to fix the gearbox with a wire. Martin stepped in at that moment, and he did a one-hour run. He couldn’t be consistent, so I knew the problem hadn’t been fixed.

I was going to finish the race, doing the last stint. Had I been on my own I would have gone back to the pits, stopped the car and tried again next time, because the gearbox wasn’t working well at all. Every time the weight load changed the third gear would slip out and the car would go in neutral, which made it very hard to drive. I knew I had to do it as a works driver though. I also knew that the boys in the team had worked for two hours on that car, and I wanted to give them at least the pleasure to see that car crossing the finish line, no matter how hard it was going to be to drive the car in that situation.

In the first few laps of my stint the gearbox was almost working well, even though I lost third gear every time I used a kerb, and I still was half a second quicker than in free practice, which was tough as I realised we could have been competitive for somewhere about P5. Anyway I managed to get that car to the finish line, and it was a great feeling to see the boys cheering on the pit wall.

There was never time to be sorry about what happened. The tight schedule, the many things we had to do and the effort the crew put in made it impossible to even think about what was going on. I was given tasks and I had to do what I was asked to do. I was more than happy to do it and I could fully trust the team. I knew we had a great car and could have done good things if only we hadn’t had a bit of bad luck.

The problems we had also gave me the chance to live the frustration a racing driver experiences when he can’t do anything but waiting in the car and hoping that the mechanics can fix the car. That is a big part of motorsport and a works driver is not allowed to be angry or sorry, he just has to wait and give 100% when he’s asked to go out.

That was a unique experience on a great car, in a great team and in a very good championship. It’s a friendly environment outside the car, but when it comes to the racing it’s hard but fair. The ADAC Cruze Cup is an ideal series in which to gain experience, because of the low cost nature of the car and the huge track time it grants in every weekend.

Chevrolet Europe and Maurer Motorsport helped me to have a wonderful time and made me feel like a proper works driver. I understand that when you drive for a manufacturer you have to trust the people around you, do what they ask you to do and perform at your best all the time. There’s no room for thinking about anything other than racing. It’s the best feeling a driver can experience.