The rain didn’t take long to arrive during the first IDM Sidecar qualifying session at the Schleizer Dreieck. All seven sidecar teams therefore decided to end practice early and concede defeat to the weather gods for the time being. The first free practice session on Friday afternoon had already taken place partly in rainy conditions, so hopes are now pinned on the second qualifying session on Saturday, when forecasts predict dry conditions.
Josef Sattler and Luca Schmidt (Team Bonovo Action Team/LCR Yamaha) dominated Friday and set a lap time of 1:34.353 minutes that everyone else had to beat. But no one else came close to that time. Trailing by a good second were guest starters Enrico Wirth and Werner Leo Lüttke (Zweirad Wirth/LCR Yamaha). The two are familiar faces in the International Sidecar Trophy, where they swept the board last year in their first season together. They posted a lap time of 1:35.455 minutes and were ranked second fastest.
Ted and Vincent Peugeot (Seventy-Four Racing Team/LCR Yamaha) finished third, just three hundredths of a second behind, followed by Peter Kimeswenger and Ondrej Sedlacek (MRSC Gunskirchen) and Max Zimmermann and Ronja Mahl (Zimmermann Racing/ARS Yamaha), who came in fifth.
“I just don’t have a feel for the bike when it rains,” said Lennard Göttlich (Team Bonovo Action Team/LCR Yamaha) after the first free practice session on Friday afternoon, when it had already started to rain briefly. That lack of feel didn’t improve during the wet qualifying session either, so the young development team had to settle for sixth place for now. Only Markus Schwegler and Ondrej Kopecky (Motorsport Königswartha/LCR Yamaha) seemed to struggle the most with the challenges. They finished in seventh place, bringing up the rear.
The second qualifying session will take place on Saturday at 11:35 a.m., followed by the sprint race at 5:40 p.m. The race will be streamed live and free of charge at www.idm.de/live.
IDM SSP 300 Results – Qualifying 1:
- Josef SATTLER/Luca SCHMIDT (GER)
- Enrico WIRTH/Werner Leon LÜTTKE (GER)
- Ted PEUGEOT/Vincent PEUGEOT (FRA)
- Peter KIMESWENGER/Ondrej SEDLACEK (GER/CZE)
- Max ZIMMERMANN/Ronja MAHL (GER)
- Lennard GÖTTLICH/Lukas KRIEG (GER)
- Markus SCHWEGLER/Ondrej KOPECKY (GER/CZE)