Nurburgring 24H: BMW Thursday report

First qualifying session on the Nordschleife red-flagged due to fog.

Nurburgring, 13th May 2010. The weather at the Nurburgring (DE) has taken centre stage at the start of the race weekend. The first qualifying session for the 2010 Nurburgring 24 Hours was red-flagged after just three hours. Thick fog at places on the 25.378-kilometre circuit left the race organisers with no choice but to take this safety measure.

The Team BMW Motorsport drivers set their personal best times in the first phase of the qualifying session. The no. 26 BMW M3 GT2, driven by Dirk Werner (DE), Dirk Muller (DE), Andy Priaulx (GB) and Dirk Adorf (DE), ended the session fourth overall with a time of 9:37.984 minutes. The car with Jorg Muller (DE), Augusto Farfus (BR), Uwe Alzen (DE) and Pedro Lamy (PT) at the wheel was 14th fastest. Dominik Farnbacher (DE), Allan Simonsen (DK), Keen Lehman (US) and Marco Seefried (DE) secured provisional pole, setting a time of 9:20.952 minutes in their Ferrari F430 GTC.

The drivers will have another opportunity to improve their positions in the second qualifying session from 12:45hrs to 14:45hrs on Friday.

Jorg Muller (Car Number 25): "By the end of the session we were having to drop into third gear on the Dottinger Hohe due to the fog - that tells you everything about the conditions. Then I just drove on the Grand Prix circuit, as the visibility out there on the Nordschleife was abysmal. Generally speaking, it went well for us. It was primarily about ensuring every driver completed two laps in order to qualify for the race."

Andy Priaulx (Car Number 26): "The conditions were really difficult. You could hardly tell whether that section of the circuit was just damp or really wet. The conditions were changing constantly, so you could never find a real rhythm. The decision to abort the session due to the fog was absolutely correct. I hope it will be a bit easier in the second qualifying session."

-source: bmw