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RAM Racing and the 24 hrs at Spa

#CTP #FullSpeed #Sport

The Total 24 Hours of Spa is a storied pinnacle of endurance racing where the track, the car, the weather and the schedule test the drivers and their crew both physically and mentally. At 16:30, July 28, engines roared into action with a race record 72-car grid. Our heroes, racing in the Pro-Am class, climbed into their Mercedes-AMG GT3 sporting a Vos-commissoned livery never before seen on the track. Taking turns behind the wheel for 1-2 hours at a time, the drivers battled nerves, the 40° celsius heat, pouring rain and their competitors, ending up 358 laps later on the podium, finishing second-in-class and just 2 minutes behind their main rival—making it one of the closest mini-competitions in the overall race.

 

CTP CEO Remon Vos is the ‘AM’ in the GT Series Pro-Am class RAM racing team, whose non-Am (i.e., professional) drivers include Darren Burke, Christiaan Frankenhout, and Tom Onslow-Cole. The team is led by team principal Dan Shufflebottom, who spent many years as lead mechanic with Michal Schumacher during his stints in F1. Vos impressed both crowd and team with his qualifying time making him the 10th quickest on the day—not bad for a third-year understudy.

 

Tom Onslow-Cole

“The main tactic in this weather is ‘survive’, there are so many opportunities to make a mistake. We need to not take risks, drive very conservatively, and we're in a good position to win. Just gotta maintain our position.”
 

Dan Shufflebottom

“We have the performance to win the class; we have one of the strongest cars with our drivers. Its really about having a clean race, spend as little time in the pits as possible, keep the car on the track and stay out of trouble with other cars”
 

Dan: We had a fantastic race with no accidents and were fighting for 1st position until the end of the race. After 24 hours we were less than 2 min away from no. 1.

Remon:  The last 15 min were ridiculous with poor visibility and extreme weather conditions. I pitted at 4:30, exactly 12 hours after the start, for necessary maintenance. When Tom got in the car we had a full course yellow, followed by the safety car for an hour. With no weather improvement, the race was stopped and continued Sunday morning. The team did a great job and the car held well, fantastic support from AMG. The track in Spa is the best track I know.

The race was challenging with different weather conditions. The team worked well together and being part of this for me is a dream come true. Unfortunately, the race was interrupted due to heavy rain and so we weren’t able to race for the entire 24 hours.

We had some bad ventilation in the car, Cristian was supposed to do a double stint, but could only do a single, same with Remon. I never saw him so exhausted in my life when he got out of the car. it was really very difficult.

 

See it all in GRID!

 

 

more in the video: https://youtu.be/8QooDIyequc