ROWE BMW Claims VLN 2 Win

The ROWE Racing BMW pairing of Jesse Krohn and Connor De Phillippi claimed victory in Saturday’s second VLN round of the season.

Krohn held off a late challenge from Dirk Mueller in the No. 14 Black Falcon Mercedes AMG-GT3 to win by 8.7 seconds.

The result marked De Phillippi’s first win as a BMW factory driver since his signing with the German manufacturer at the end of last year.

Mueller, who shared the Mercedes with Maro Engel, Adam Christodoulou and Manuel Metzger, took six seconds out of the BMW M6 GT3’s lead in the final half-hour but ran out of time in his pursuit. 

The ROWE car started seventh and was involved in the top five battle throughout the four-hour contest, but only assumed control following the final round of pit stops.

Until then, the the second half of the four-hour contest had been commanded by the Black Falcon squad, which is aiming for its third N24 victory next month.

Manthey Racing held the upper hand early on with its No. 912 Porsche 911 GT3 R, which ultimately slipped to fifth.

Additionally, the pole-sitting Manthey car of Laurens Vanthoor, Romain Dumas and Earl Bamber was consigned to its garage for repairs after picking up damage from a spin through the Mercedes Arena section.

Porsche did get a car on the overall podium, however, with the Falken Tyre entry of Klaus Bachler and Martin Ragginger crossing the line five seconds down on Mueller.

Ragginger overtook the Sheldon Van der Linde and Marcel Fassler-driven Audi R8 LMS in the final hour, as four different manufacturers occupied the top-four positions.

Class honors in the SP10 for GT4-homologated machinery went to the BMW M4 GT4 driven by Heiko Eichenberg and Yannick Mettler.