ADAC Hockenheim Historic – The Jim Clark Revival 2025: Masters Gentlemens Drivers & Pre-66 Touring Cars

Local hero Rüdiger Friedrichs produced the goods by fending off multiple challenges on his way to a debut win in the Masters Gentleman Drivers race at Hockenheim. The German AC Cobra driver surged to the front in the opening stages before the surprise pole sitter came back at him, as the Lotus 15 shared by Danish driver Jakob Viggo Holstein and last-minute supersub Horatio Fitz-Simon was high on entertainment value but missed out on victory by half a second.

“I enjoyed the entire race”, said Friedrichs. “It was bloody sensational, such a nice car, well prepared. I managed to get away from the start and made up some places because I knew that Horatio would get into the Lotus after the drivers change. As I had to stop 15 seconds longer, I had to push it from the beginning. And the Corvette approaching at the end, that was interesting. Because I’m new in this field, I thought, oooh, maybe the second driver is so much better, but it was the same driver!”

Holstein proved to be an extremely quick pedaller who handed Fitz-Simon – himself a series rookie – a healthy lead, but a safety-car period for the retrieval of Josef Rettenmaier’s Jaguar E-type threw a spanner in the works. While sitting in a bath of cooling liquid, Fitz-Simon headed for the pits to re-emerge in fifth but then stormed his way back to half a second off Friedrichs at the chequered flag. After the safety car restart, Michiel Campagne’s Corvette Grand Sport also gave chase to Friedrichs’ Cobra, but the Dutchman gave up towards the end.

“It was close to say the least”, said Fitz-Simon. “We had to make an extra pit stop when Jakob brought the car in. It had quite a lot of coolant in the seat. I went out, safety car came out and then we needed to make another stop. I was getting a bit steamy-eyed from all the coolant in the cockpit, but it was great fun just pushing to the end. Another lap, not even another lap, I’d say another corner would have been nice.”

“I started to think about taking some other hobby”, said Campagne. “Those that are shorter and less expensive! At some point I had the Cobra in front of me, so I thought I would attack it. I approached it and thought it was hard work. Then I saw we still had 20 minutes to go, and I thought, why even bother. I just wanted to relax and drive to the finish line.”

In a pair of Lotus Elans, Alexander Schlüchter and Mark Drain took third and fourth to claim first and second in the CLP class. The two fought initially, before the German waltzed off. Behind Manfredo Rossi’s Shelby Mustang GT350, the Porsche 904 shared by Dutch father-and-son combo Rob & Dante Rappange won the C1 class, while in ninth Caroline Rossi claimed C2 class honours in her Austin Healey 3000. Meanwhile, brothers Alan & Geoff emerged victorious in the concurrent 60-minute Masters Pre-66 Touring Car race.

“It was absolutely nice, first time here”, said Schlüchter. “First time with the Masters, absolutely high driving standards here. It was just a lot of fun with a small Elan here.”

“Initially at the start I had some fun with the GT cars”, said Alan Letts. “Then the gap opened out and my job was to keep it in one piece, give it to Geoff, so he could finish it off. And then after the safety car pulled in and they were all bunched up, he had some action with the Mustang and the others that were around him.”

Rounding off a Saturday full of excitement at the ADAC Hockenheim Historic, the combined Masters Gentlemen Drivers & Pre-66 Touring Car grid assembled for their curtain-closer of the day but at the same time their first round of the season. Jakob Viggo Holstein would start the Lotus 15 stuck on pole by supersub Horatio Fitz-Simon, with Rüdi Friedrichs sat beside him in his AC Cobra. Two more powerhouses followed on row two, in the shape of Michiel Campagne’s Chevrolet Corvette Grand Sport and Felix Haas in the TVR Griffith.

Nimbleness returned on the third row with the Lotus Elans of Alexander Schlüchter and Mark Drain while the Thomas Matzelberger/Ingo Strolz Griffith was the sole occupant of row four, as the Elan of Martin Stretton/Brad Baker had been withdrawn after issues in qualifying. Two family crews rounded out the top ten: father and son Rob & Dante Rappange in their C1-class Porsche 904, while brothers Alan & Geoff Letts headed the concurrent touring car field in their Lotus Cortina.

At the start, the Cobra and the Corvette quickly powered to the front, leaving the Lotus to squabble with Haas and the Elans. Behind them, Manfredo Rossi had produced a rocket start to be eighth in his Shelby Mustang GT350 ahead of Rob Rappange, Chris Jolly in another Shelby Mustang and Alan Letts in the leading touring car. 11th was Magnus Ahlqvist in the Ferrari 275 GTB/2 also shared with Holstein, with Jacques Smeer in 12th in the third Shelby Mustang in the field. The Dutchman headed Caroline Rossi in her Austin Healey Mk3000, the sole C2 competitor in this field, who in turn led Stephan Rettenmaier’s Jaguar E-type and Jakob Rettenmaier’s Porsche 911. Matzelberger was into the pits after the opening lap, something not well with the Austrian’s Griffith.

At the front, Friedrichs had powered away to a five-second lead after three laps, while Holstein kept Campagne honest in second and third. Haas was a close fourth, but behind the German a big gap had opened to Drain, who had passed Schlüchter for the CLP class lead, with Rossi (M.) also passing the other Elan. One lap later, the Italian was up into fifth and the first of the chasers. Jolly was eighth ahead of Letts (A.), while Ahlqvist had passed Rappange (R.) for tenth.

Meanwhile, Holstein was getting into a groove, and the Lotus passed the Corvette going into lap 5. His teammate Ahlqvist was less happy though, the Dane’s Ferrari reporting to the pits at the end of that lap, allowing Smeer, Rossi (C.) and the Rettenmaiers to each move up a spot. One lap later, Ahlqvist rejoined in 14th place, but would retire a few laps later.

Instead of increasing his advantage, Friedrichs now faced a fast-arriving Holstein whose fastest sector times all accumulated to a diminishing margin of 3.4 seconds after six laps. Behind them, Haas was closing in on the fast-starting Campagne, whose times began to drop. The opposite applied to Holstein who had now cut the gap to half a second to seriously threaten to Cobra up front. Meanwhile in fifth, Rossi (M.) still had both Elans snapping at his heels, some 50 seconds away from the lead battle. Jolly and Letts were up next, each separated by some 15 seconds, while Dutchmen Rappange and Smeer circulated in tenth and 11th. The latter still had his hands full with Caroline Rossi’s Big Healey.

On lap 9, after a couple of tours looking for an opportunity, Holstein’s Lotus moved into the lead to immediately break away from Friedrichs in the Cobra. Campagne and Haas now trailed the leading pair by 20 seconds while Rossi, Drain and Schlüchter had their own race 38 seconds further down the road, culminating in the German sweeping past both rivals on lap 12.

Right at that moment, the touring car pit window opened for the Letts brothers to perform their driver swap, but for the moment Alan stayed out before handing the steering wheel to Geoff. The swap would eventually be made on lap 14, when the GT cars’ pit window also opened up. Meanwhile, Holstein’s lead over Friedrichs had accumulated to eight seconds while Campagne found another lease of life to slightly close on the one German while slowly dropping the other from his rear-view mirror.

Drain and Rossi (C.) were the first Gent Drivers runners to come in for their mandatory stops, soon followed in by the leader. Holstein had done a brilliant opening stint and would now hand over to Horatio Fitz-Simon. Schlüchter was in next, followed by Friedrichs, Jakob Rettenmaier (handing over to Klara) and Smeer. On lap 17, Haas and Rappange came in, the latter handing over to son Dante, while Stephan Rettenmaier gave the E-type to Josef. Of the leaders, Campagne, Haas, Rossi (M.) and Jolly were the last to stop, with Steve Farthing taking over from Jolly. Haas, meanwhile, failed to re-emerge from the pits.

When all the cars had cycled through their mandatory stops, Fitz-Simon led Friedrichs by 21 seconds, while Campagne was a full minute down. Twenty more ticks in arrears, Schlüchter led Drain in fourth and fifth, but the Elans were now separated by some 20 seconds.
But then Josef Rettenmaier’s Jaguar E-type finished a wild spin out of the Bernie-Ecclestone-Kurve in the outside grass of the Parabolika, so that called for the safety car. Suddenly, everyone’s work to build a gap would be undone… Meanwhile, in a further sad twist for the Rettenmaier family, Klara Rettenmaier was into the pits with her Porsche 911.

Quick work was made of retrieving the E-type from its grassy knoll, so the race was back underway on lap 23, with 23 more minutes remaining on the clock for the GT runners in this 75-minute race. Shockingly though, Fitz-Simon pulled into the pits instead of restarting the race, leaving Friedrichs back into the lead. The Lotus was back out again when the entire field had completed half a lap, having done a bit of mid-race refuelling that isn’t allowed in the rules.

So now Friedrichs was the new race leader, with Rossi (M.) as the first lapped car acting as a buffer to Campagne, five seconds down, and Schlüchter ten seconds and back into a fight with Drain. Fitz-Simon was still on the same lap, but now in fifth, ahead of Rossi, Rappange (D.), Farthing, Letts (G.), Smeer and Rossi (C.), the latter two another lap down.

Smelling blood, Campagne got the bit between his teeth, and cut the gap to Friedrichs to four seconds, and then two seconds on the next lap, while Fitz-Simon recorded the fastest lap of the race in fifth, but now a whopping 55 seconds away from the leader. Ahead of him, Schlüchter had reopened the gap to Drain, which now stood back at some 15 seconds. A lap down, GT World Challenge driver Dante Rappange moved his Porsche 904 past Rossi to snatch sixth. In the meantime, the German national flag was waved for touring car winners Alan and Geoff Letts in their Cortina.

Now we had less than 15 minutes left to decide who would be the winner of the GT race. Having seen his lead shrunk to some two seconds, Friedrichs began to manage that gap, and by lap 28, he got it back up to three seconds. For the moment, Schlüchter still looked a safe third, 19 seconds down, but Drain was fearing the loss of fourth place to Fitz-Simon as their diverging pace brought them together on lap 29 before changing places. The Lotus 15 now trailed the other Lotus Elan by 12 seconds, and a truly unleashed Fitz-Simon was lapping a massive eight seconds faster. Even the leaders would have to worry, as they could not match the 15’s pace either, lapping five seconds slower on average.

With five minutes remaining, Friedrichs had fought off Campagne’s initial challenge to now lead the Dutchman by 12 seconds. The Corvette was dropping seconds every lap now, and began to lose time to Schlüchter in third, now just 11 seconds away. In fact, Fitz-Simon was in the car in third on lap 31, and just eight seconds away – a margin that he would be able to negate in a single lap. Behind Schlüchter and Drain, Rappange (D.) was in trouble too, forced into a second pitstop and

Three minutes remained when Fitz-Simon duly passed Campagne for second place, and now had 16 seconds to cover to Friedrichs while lapping seven seconds faster. Would there be enough time? And what about a refuelling penalty looming over his head? Sure enough, with one minute still to go, the Lotus 15 was handed a time penalty of an additional lap to rule it out of the podium spots.

Friedrichs hung on to his lead until the end, by a mere five tenths, and it was well for the German that he did, as the penalty was rescinded when afterwards the fluids going into the car proved to be the topping up of coolant that the drivers had been sitting in all race! Campagne was third, with Schlüchter and Drain in fourth and fifth and the first two in the CLP class. A lap down, Manfredo Rossi in the first of the Shelby Mustang GT350s was sixth, with Dante Rappagne recovering to seventh ahead of the Jolly/Farthing Shelby Mustang, while Caroline Rossi pipped Smeer to ninth overall, the Dutchman’s Mustang having failed to complete its final lap.