"Sunshine and great temperatures during testing and practice; but on race day, heavens opened and the track was flooded not dissimilar as the 4 hour ETCC race in 1974.
Division 1
During testing on Friday, local hero van Oorschot, a fine driver by any standard had been fastest of all. But in practice, van Oorschot came no further than 1.29,72, good enough for 7th on the grid but not more. Hezemans was the only one to crack the 1.27 border, setting pole in 1.26,98, over half a second faster than anyone else, but behind him the places 2 to 5 were covered by just 3/10ths of a second.
Konrad had trouble to start the warm-up lap and “John Winter” banged into him - we were two cars short at the start already.
Fitzpatrick went like a rocket after the start, remembered the wet racing line he learned from Rob Slotemaker ten years ago and was unbeatable. Wollek was second, followed by Hezemans, Schurti and Ludwig. Soon Hezemans took second with Schurti slipping past Wollek at the same time, but the Max Moritz car retired just a little later. Wollek tried to counter at Panorama, but missed his braking point in the haze and left the track. Behind the three Loos cars, Bourgoignie was fourth. Now the Loos-show could begin: although Hezemans was unable to close on Fitzpatrick (quite the contrary, he kept taking the wettest line in some corners), the championship could decide the finish:
Matt's note: (The following is a bit confusing, but basically what Frank is saying is that there were team orders from the pit wall to alter the race order, in order of the drivers numbers: #06 - Toine Hezemans, #08, John Fitzpatrick, #09 - Klaus Ludwig until it was changed last second.)
Loos showed the sign 1-2-3, 6-8-9 slow, so Hezemans first and Fitz second; and the latter, every inch a gentleman, slowed down. But after some discussions, the sign was changed into 8-6-9, Fitz roared on and won the race, with Hezemans telling the outside world that he hoped these five points would not cost him the championship.
Division 2
No local flavour in Division 2 here, but some news nonetheless. Winkelhock’s HAT team had swapped their turbo engine for an atmospheric one (a used one from Helmut Bross), so the team could concentrate on the car rather than the troublesome development engine.
Behind Ertl and Höttinger, Winkelhock duelled with Heyer and soon both of them got by the two leaders.
Winkelhock and Heyer touched in Tarzan corner, Heyer forced into the grass for a while. A few laps later his throttle cable broke, he repaired it himself in order to get to the its - and after having lost eight laps, he joined the fray and battled with Winkelhock as if nothing had happened. Useless, but he tried to irritate Winkelhock, but the latter just continued and won the race. Behind him, Ertl and Höttinger had a fight too, Ertl unable to use his horsepower advantage because of the rain.
During the race, Höttinger had lost contact with Ertl, but then he forced his way back and in the last lap it was nose to tail, and when Ertl locked a wheel, Höttinger tried to slip by on the inside but missed his braking point - and bumped into the Schnitzer turbo car. He punctured a tyre, but was able to finish third behind Winkelhock and Ertl."
Frank De Jong, March 4th 1959 - March 10th 2018
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