Niederhauser: Rutronik Had to “Risk Something” for Win Chance

Photo: Porsche

Rutronik Racing had to “risk something” in order to have a chance of fighting for the win in the CrowdStrike 24 Hours of Spa according to Patric Niederhauser, who admitted he was initially “surprised” by the call to go off-sequence on pit strategy.

Niederhauser and co-drivers Sven Mueller and Alessio Picariello finished second in their No. 96 Porsche 911 GT3 R after coming up short to the winning No. 63 Grasser Racing Team Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2, which had more pace to offset the German squad’s strategic run.

The Klaus Graf-led squad elected to keep Niederhauser out on track during the race’s ninth safety car period in the 17th hour, which saw all but three of the top contenders pit for service.

It therefore offset their pit sequence to their rivals, which Niederhauser said gave them a fighting chance of the win.

“I was surprised, yes, but in a positive way,” he told Sportscar365. “In the end, they’re the best in the business and I think that was the right call to do.

“Obviously we didn’t expect to do it but it was the right call to make. We had to risk something. It was clear we couldn’t win the race just on our outright pace.

“We had to do something different.

“They told me, ‘stay out, stay out.’ I was like, ‘Are you guys sure?’ Then, I was like, ‘OK, let’s go and try.'”

The defining moment in the race for the team, however, came in the four hours later when Picariello pitted just moments before a FCY came out, that saw the Porsche gain a significant advantage 0ver its competition.

“In the end, this saved our podium,” said Niederhauser.

The team, however, escaped a potentially race-ending moment with 1 hour and 48 minutes to go when Mueller sustained a puncture at Blanchimont on his scheduled in-lap, which forced him to slow and hand the lead back to Mirko Bortolotti.

“In my in lap in Karting 2, I really felt like the tire pressure was going down,” said Mueller. “Then in this situation you really need to just survive and don’t risk it because the podium was quite sure at that moment but in a situation like this you could lose everything.

“I didn’t want to risk anything. There was still two hours to go, so in this race, it was still long to go and anything could happen. You need to stay focused and just bring it home.”

While it cost the car several seconds to the Lamborghini, Niederhauser thought their luck potentially turned around during Bortolotti’s final pit stop when the Italian driver stalled his car.

“That was communicated to me and they were like, ‘go, go go, push, push push!’ But I wasn’t doing anything different anyway,” he said. “I was out there giving it my all.

“In my last two stints I was quite unlucky when I pitted, when we were off-sequence with Mirko, I just caught traffic quite badly two times which cost me some time.

“Especially the second time with [Mirko’s] problem, maybe I would have been in front.

“Still, they had more pace than us, clearly.”

Picariello agreed with his co-drivers in admitting they didn’t have the ultimate pace of the winning Lamborghini.

“I think our strength was our consistency and our strategy as well and also the fact that we didn’t do any mistakes,” he said. “Every pit stop worked perfectly. We didn’t get any penalties.

“We had a really clean car for the end, which is really key here. We were trying to avoid some curbs the whole race in order to have a good car in the end and to fully send it in the last two hours.

“We did what we had to do. In the end we were not strong enough but we can be proud about P2.”

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