BMW super-subs win Nogaro BSS final

On-loan BMW factory drivers Dirk Muller and Maxime Martin gave Team Brazil a very narrow victory over the lead WRT Audi in the main Nogaro Blancpain Sprint Series race.

WRT's Stephane Richelmi and Stephane Ortelli had resisted the BMW in Sunday's qualifying race, but the roles were reversed in Monday's headline event. Martin passed Richelmi on lap one and escaped into a five-second lead, although it was the initially third-placed WRT car of Christopher Mies and Enzo Ide that emerged in the lead after the pit stop sequence, following a very quick early driver change.

Ide could not fend off Muller for long, and he let the faster Ortelli through as well, setting up a chase to the flag. Despite Ortelli's best efforts, Muller held on by just 0.368 seconds to take victory in what is likely to be a one-off appearance before the regular lineup – all busy in Brazilian Stock Cars this week – returns.

The WRT cars completed the podium on a weekend compromised by the loss of its #1 car in qualifying, when new signing Robin Frijns crashed and damaged the chassis of the Audi he will share with Blancpain GT Series champion Laurens Vanthoor.

Maxi Buhk and Vincent Abril's HTP Bentley came through to fourth ahead of Marco Seefried and Norbert Siedler's Rinaldi Ferrari.

Bernd Schneider was in the podium hunt in the GT Russian Mercedes in the opening stint, but his less experienced team-mate Alexey Karachev fell back to 11th.

RESULTS - 41 LAPS:

Originally on Autosport.com