No power steering for the SunEnergy1 Mercedes. The pit crew is fixing the car, but there is very little room to work under the bonnet of these modern GT3 cars. It would be a superhuman effort to be driving a car for three hours around this place with no power steering. It looks like they are going for the power steering pump or some of the cooling ducts in the grille of the car. Darkness has fallen. It is nearly pitch black on the road. Miguel Molina leads Kelvin van der Linde by half a minute. Pit stops coming for some of the leading cars. Raffaele Marciello passes the Audi through Barbecue, Sunset, and Clubhouse, following into the esses. The esses remain from the old circuit before Leeukop had it's configuration change. The old circuit had a mile long straightaway.
Jules Gounon says that he will drive and see what the engineers do. The team plans two more stops before the end of the race in their battle with the #51 AF Corse Ferrari. Jules Gounon will finish the race after Raffaele Marciello completes his stint. Jules Gounon will do a double stint. Top Watch will present a watch to the fastest lap contender since Super Pole was cancelled. Audi #32 is in the lane as power steering repairs continue on the #75 Mercedes. Michael Markussen, sixth overall, takes the lead of the Pro-Am class lead aboard the #33 High Class Racing Audi R8. Ferrari has pitted and Alessandro Pier Guidi is now at the controls.
Trouble it appears for the #26 Sainteloc Audi? Nicolas Baert brought the car in but has handed over to either Simon Gachet or Lucas Legeret. Maybe there is a steering wheel problem. So, the sister car is in the lane as well from a short-lived lead. Kelvin van der Linde is in the lane now. Darkness has fallen. It will be pitch dark in 15-20 minutes after sundown. Into the garage goes Audi #26 from fifth spot. The #25 entry is back on track. #26 is the only Silver Cup entry in this race and the rear bonnet comes off the automobile. Maybe there is an electronic problem or perhaps something emechanical. Kelvin van der Linde is running well aboard the sister car.
Raffaele Marciello leads the motor race. The #26 could not start. They fired the car and it is down off the air jacks. That was a quick stop although the driver's door is being opened again. They are trying to see if the engine cranks. Some jiggery pokery on the dashboard or on the multifunctional steering wheel. The car is stopped and the ignition system it appears is what the trouble is. The Baert, Legeret, Gachet car is fifth in the overall. In the points standings, Pier Guidi and Ledogar could still very well win the title. The electrical gremlins continue for the #26. How they got the car to run in the garage, is a mystery.
Back to the garage for the Audi. They are still fifth, but Michael Markusen is coming in a hurry. Raffaele Marciello leads Alessandro Pier Guidi now by 22 seconds. Now the #26 Audi has the engine cover off. The rear engine GT3 cars have very complex systems, and the engine bay is cramped. So, the Audi, the McLaren 720S GT3, the Porsche 911 GT3R, the Lamborghini Huracan, and the Ferrari 488 GT3 for instance. The wind his dropped. Maybe the Audi will be able to fire up this time back on the pit apron. Yes! They've done it! So, #26 is back in the race. High Class Racing are moving ahead. Simon Gachet is now at the wheel of the #26 car.
Mercedes #75 is still in the garage with a hydraulic issue and a cooling issue. These cars are so tightly packaged. You have to strip half the front end of the car off to find the parts that need to be worked on. The cooler and hoses will be replaced and the air has to be bled out. Power steering fluid was being bled out. ou can see how pitch dark it is here at Kyalami save for the pit lane and the suburban area of Johannesburg. This is a magic moment racing at night. Yours truly has seen it at Daytona International Speedway in the Rolex 24 in person before. #75 is buttoned up and ready to go. They are headed out of the garage.
Kenny Habul is surely concerned about the points. He and the team have run 65% of the distance so far. They need 70% to score points. The tires will be stone cold. Keep going. The power steering must be working by now. It is pitch dark at Kyalami. In the darkness, you see the orange glow of the exhaust pipes. Marciello leads Alessandro Pier Guidi by 25 and a half seconds. Marciello will hand the car to Jules Gounon for the final double stint. Never give up. Stay positive. Through Barbecue Bend the cars stream and into Sunset corner where it's lights out.
There is so little light apart from pit lane around the track here at Kyalami. The surface of the circuit is very clean and there are no gravel traps here. Barbecue Bend was the only spot where the gravel trap was an issue. The gravel is by and large, offline, and everyone has been well behaved with two and a half hours left. Kelvin van der Linde and Raffaele Marciello are fastest through Sunset corner, three kilometers faster than some of the Audi's. Ferrari have gone for straight line speed, sacrificing aerodynamic performance. The Mercedes is quickest overall and seems to be the best balanced car.
Marciello leads Pier Guidi by 29 seconds. Pier Guidi has an equal amrgin over Kelvin van der Linde and the Mercedes has clear pace over everybody else with just over two hours to go. We will see around 300 laps completed. Another track limits warning for the #51 AF Corse Ferrari. Once you get to the nighttime hours, how do you see well enough to monitor track limits? That is a good question. Maybe they have a static camera on a specific corner, perhaps the final corner at turn 16, Ingwe. Psychologically, drivers may wonder if they've done all they can.
Ferrari #51 on track and not over the limits. 7:35 P.M. in Kyalami, South African. This race will end about 10PM. The drivers' eyes are now fully adjusted to the darkness. Ferrari still has the advantage with Come Ledogar and Alessandro Pier Guidi. Nicklas Nielsen and company are out with what is believed to be gearbox trouble. The ambient tmperature and track temperature are still dropping as Michael van Rooyen pits his Lamborghini in the National GT3 category. You can't buy experience. You have to earn it in a category of racing that has a high level of competition.
The track is changing all the time. 1:49.4 is the fastest lap for the Lamborghini, 5.5 seconds slower than the #86 entry. You have to climb a mountain, learn from the knowledge of other drivers. Many drivers are naturally gifted and talented while others use hard work and application to drive. The smaller field helps in terms of the nighttime driving. A track walk is very important for newly minted racing drivers in endurance races. Kenny Habul is officially champion in the Pro-Am division in Intercontinental GT Challenge in 2021. Based on the darkness, Kyalami is one of the hardest tracks to drive on. At Daytona International Speedway there is a much greater amount of light.
It is as black as ink in the darkness. Le Mans has areas of light and dark. It is all dark at the Nurburgring in Germany. In Africa, the darkness is probably the most in these races at Kyalami. Kenny Habul's lap record at 1:42.285, it was not as fast ass Matty Campbell's overall record. Raffaele Marciello wants more. He has gone through the lane for a driver time reset. Two hours and ten minutes left. The maximum stint time is 65 minutes. The Ferrari's reset after 37 laps and drove a further nine laps on their remaining fuel. Jules Gounon will have less than two hours to drive a double stint and everything should run like clockwork.
37 laps was 63 and a half minutes, 90 seconds shy of the full stint length at 65 minutes. You have to be good at average math to calculate these endurance races and interpret the rules. Marciello leads Pier Guidi by almost 16 seconds. Jules Gounon is wearing glasses maybe for reading or for driving at night, probably bifocals. The gap from first to second is 16.2 seconds. 1:42.8 for Marciello and 1:43.3 for the Ferrari. The gap to Charles Weerts is increasing compared to Kelvin van der Linde. Jules Gounon is wearing glasses so he isn't blinded by the headlights of passing cars. Makes perfect sense.
You are going all over the place as far as the difference between light and darkness. Lamborghini #23 pits, the Stradale Into Africa entry with Philip Kekana who has just haded the car the Xolile Letlaka. Jules Gounon will be into the car for the final two hours as we have bang on two hours to go. Come Ledogar could finish the race in the Ferrari, but we don't know that yet as the #33 High Class Racing Audi is in the pit lane leading Pro-Am.
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