Fourth place in the opening race and fifth in the second. That was the outcome of Josef Hrdlička’s weekend at the third round of this year’s Porsche Sports Cup Deutschland. Like the rest of the field, the Mičánek Motorsport driver had to contend with extreme temperatures at the Nürburgring. As if the conditions were not demanding enough, a failed cooling fan made the challenge even tougher.
“The heat was unbelievable. Racing in those conditions was absolutely brutal,” Hrdlička summed up after the weekend. The Mičánek Motorsport driver faced a field of 13 competitors, made up of both Porsche 911 GT3 Cup cars and Cayman GT4 RS Clubsport entries.
Hrdlička started both 30-minute races from fifth on the grid. In Saturday morning’s opening contest, he immediately gained one position and crossed the line in fourth after securing the place in the opening corners.
“We had a battle right into the first corner,” Hrdlička recalls of what turned into one of the key moments of the race. “There were three of us going into it and we made contact. I ended up with a damaged door, while Michal Perel had to retire after damaging a wheel,” he explains. The incident ultimately proved decisive in securing fourth place overall.
Conditions during the morning race were still manageable. “It wasn’t too bad then. We raced in the morning, the circuit hadn’t overheated yet, and I was on fresh tyres, so everything felt under control,” he says.
The afternoon race, however, proved much more difficult, with Hrdlička unable to repeat his fourth-place finish and instead taking the chequered flag in fifth.
“Under the regulations, we have to use the same tyres in the second race as in the first. Because Michal Perel retired early, he was able to preserve his tyres and had a clear advantage later on. Towards the end, he was lapping about a second quicker than everyone else. The track was incredibly hot and very slippery, while my tyres were already heavily worn,” explains the protégé of Jiří Mičánek Sr., the 25-time Czech champion in circuit racing and hillclimbs.
Tyre wear, however, was only part of the problem.
“On the formation lap I realised the cooling fan wasn’t working. I then spent half an hour sealed inside the car without any ventilation and was genuinely relieved when I finally got out. The air temperature was 41°C, the track was around 70°C, and inside the cockpit it must have been close to 75°C. It was an incredibly tough half-hour,” Hrdlička admits.
A drinks bottle, something drivers in Porsche Sports Cup Deutschland rarely carry during the 30-minute sprint races, would have been more than welcome this time. “I drank three litres of fluids after the race,” says Hrdlička. “We normally don’t carry drinks bottles because sprint races are usually short enough without one, and of course every extra kilogram adds weight to the car, which is always a disadvantage.”
Hrdlička will not have to wait long for his next outing. The fourth round of the Porsche Sports Cup Deutschland takes place on 11-12 July at the Red Bull Ring in Austria. There, he will be looking to build on the consistency he showed at the Nürburgring and on the strong form from the opening weekend at Hockenheim, where he secured his first podium finish in the championship with third place in Race 2 after finishing fourth in the opener.
