Herberth Porsches Take 1-2 Finish in 24H Portimao

Photo: Petr Fryba/Creventic

In the first real-world race to be held in Europe since the COVID-19 pandemic, Herberth Motorsport secured a 1-2 finish in the Hankook 24 Hours of Portimao.

Tim Mueller took the checkered flag after completing 731 laps of the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve to secure victory for the German squad’s No. 92 Porsche 911 GT3 R he shared with Taki Konstantinou, Juergen Haring, Michael Joos and Marco Seefried.

The result marked the first overall win in the event for Herberth, which won in class at last year’s race en-route to the A6-Am teams’ title in the 24H Series Europe championship standings.

Herberth also broke the event’s previous distance record, 722 laps, set at the inaugural running by Bohemia Energy by Scuderia Praha in 2017.

The team’s sister No. 91 Porsche of Daniel Allemann, Ralf Bohn and brothers Robert and Alfred Renauer produced a storming recovery drive to finish 2nd overall.

The car had a three-lap lead at the eight-hour mark but lost more than an hour in the garage due to a gearbox change.

After rejoining, Robert Renauer set the race’s fastest lap.

The highest placed 991 category runner, the No. 921 Muehlner Motorsport Porsche 991 Cup car of Moritz Kranz, Carlos Vieira, Tom Cloet and Jeroen Bleekemolen completed an all-Porsche podium in third overall.

It easily won its class after the No. 978 Speed Lover Porsche battled mechanical issues.

Muehlner completed a successful weekend by also taking class honors in the new Cayman class with its No. 421 Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 of Kranz, Axel Sartingen, Daniel Schwerfeld, Thorsten Jung and Daniel Bohr.

The overall pole-sitting No. 84 HTP Winward Motorsport Mercedes-AMG GT3 retired in the third hour after a heavy accident by Bryce Ward, escaped injury in the impact.

The two GT4 entries in the race, fielded by PROsport Racing and Parkalgar Racing Team, also failed to finish the twice-around-the-clock enduro.

TCE honors, meanwhile, went to the No. 112 Autorama Motorsport by Wolf-Power Racing Volkswagen Golf GTi TCR of Roberto Ferri, Miklas Born, Antti Buri, Kari-Pekka Laaksonen and Yannick Mettler.

Nine of the 15 cars took the checkered flag in the first international sports car race in more than three months.

The next round on the 24H Series calendar is the rescheduled Hankook 12H Monza on July 10-11.

RESULTS: 24H Portimao

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John