Bortolotti: Iron Lynx Taking “Low-Key Approach” at Nürburgring

Mirko Bortolotti believes Iron Lynx should take a “low-key approach” to the third round of the Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS Endurance Cup at the Nürburgring as the team looks to bounce back from a disappointing outing at the CrowdStrike 24 Hours of Spa.

Bortolotti, Andrea Caldarelli and Matteo Cairoli retired from the Belgian endurance classic after a collision led to radiator damage in a race in which it fell behind fellow Lamborghini squad GRT Grasser Racing Team.

The non-finish at Spa came after a strong start to the season at Paul Ricard, where the No. 63 Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 started from pole position and went on to finish second behind ROWE Racing.

Speaking to Sportscar365, Bortolotti expressed a hope for the team to hit the reset button at what has historically been a strong track for Lamborghini.

“I think it’s fair to say that we should have a bit of a low-key approach to this weekend, looking at what happened at Spa,” Bortolotti said.

“It was a really surprising kind of weekend generally. We were not where we wanted to be. For sure for there have been some investigations going on trying to understand why and what went wrong.

“Now it’s the past, we need to focus on this race. It’s been always a good place to go in the last years. We had our last Endurance Cup win here at Nürburgring a few years back, so good memories.

“Also [on the] personal side I think I took my first ever win here in the Endurance Cup as well in 2016 so it’s great to race at Nürburgring. Obviously the weather here is always crazy.”

Bortolotti described Iron Lynx’s Spa result as a “big setback” after the Paul Ricard podium, but expressed a hope that a “step-by-step, session-by-session” mindset can allow the team to regain lost momentum.

“Looking at our situation, we’ve had a really good start to the season and Spa has been a big setback.

“But as I said before, we’ve been strong here in the Endurance Cup in the past, so I hope ideally that we can be strong this weekend.

“As I said, really entering this weekend with a low-key approach and try to go step by step, session by session. Do the best job we can and then we’ll see what we are on Sunday.”

Conditions during this weekend are likely to be mixed with both rain and sunshine predicted. Although dryer conditions are expected for the race, Bortolotti warned not to take any forecasts as absolute truth.

To that end, he expressed a hope that data gathered during wet running, such as during Friday morning’s opening test session, will still be beneficial as the weekend progresses.

“Don’t forget we’re at the Nürburgring so things can change really quickly,” he said.

“The weather can be changing, even if the forecast is sunshine it can be pouring rain ten minutes after that.

“So for sure, we will take all the information we can take from from the wet running because in case it’s wet at least we got something in the back [pocket].

“Last year we really strong in the wet qualifying. It actually helped us to qualify on the front row. Probably I would prefer a wet race to a dry race at the current state. That’s just a personal opinion.

“But if it’s gonna be dry on Sunday, the wet running will not help us.”