Histo Cup was actually the main event of the Brno racing weekend with the Sports Car Challenge Austria support race. Histo Cup was not only the name of the entire meeting but also the main historic race. A big surprise, even missing on the provisional entry list, was the presence of original Ford Supercapri Turbo Zakspeed in its colours well-know from the DRM hey-day. It was brought here by Stefan Mücke, Aston Martin factory driver, who shortly drove it on Friday, and his father Peter who won both races quite easily lapping almost entire field in only 10-lap long race.
Mücke won both races with a margin over 2 minutes while setting his best lap at 2:08.1. The rest of the field was lapping between 2:21 and 2:40 (a few cars even slower) - those included two 2-litre Group 5 BMW 320, or Jaguar D-type, the only entered prototype in the race. There were two exceptions - American built Pontiac Firebirds, both of which set their fastest in low 2:18s, which actually never finished a race but were still notably quicker than the rest of the huge and very diversified field. Series promoter Martin Sahl in one of Group 5 BMW left the track in the first lap of race 1 and from the rear of the field he improved to finish eight. After retirement of one remaining Pontiac, which broke an axle and DNS race 2, two Porsche 911s completed the podium.
In race 2 Steffny had no problems and finished third after early retirement of one quick Pontiac, which within a few lap overtook almost entire field (the car started from the back after early retirement in race 1). The silver podium position belonged a bit surprisingly to smaller Ford Escort BDA, driven by Martin Sahl, who easily won under 2000 cc class. Porsches now took fourth, fifth and sixth positions. The race was an interesting overview of some great machinery mainly from the 70s and early 80s but not limited to this period. Best speaking would be the photos.
Another interesting historic race was called Formel Historic included even some sports cars. Officially Sports 2000 was one of the classes but they were easily outpaced by Formula 3 cars but there was another notable sports car. It was ex-Adámek/Hasenbichler Interserie March-HSB-Audi-Turbo Can-Am formula 2-based special, brought and driven here by its current owner, Adam Klus. He was easily fastest in qualifying, especially after his main competitor Franz Guggemos, who entered Graham Hill's own Formula 1 construction from 1975, left the meeting only after the free practice.
Hill set 2:09 in the practice, while Klus in March-HSB had 2:11. In qualifying Klus improved to 2:06, however he also suffered problems with brake overheating - the problem that was actually never solved, so Adam Klus had to save brakes and often use just engine to slow the car before turns. This was the only reason he actually did not win with a huge margin as Mücke did. In fact the first race was rather dramatic, when Klus was moved five positions back on the grid, for overtaking under yellow.
After the start he actually did not overtake his opponent, as it was expected but in fact ran rather slowly and lost several other positions during the first lap. Many were afraid that some mechanical troubles hit the car and the most attractive entry of the race might soon retire but our hope appeared to be correct, as the driver confirmed to us after the race. Adam Klus actually wanted to avoid any possible contact with other cars, to save his very rare car, which is usually just hill climbing, and was waiting till the field would spread a bit - then he improved every lap and soon appeared in the lead. Unfortunately for Adam, he missed the podium, assuming the race will consist of both heats. In any case, he got his cup later on and we took some nice photographs of this wonderful man and car.
The second race which inherited its grid positions from the results of race 1 had actually drama only during the first lap. Second running Roland Wiltschberg with older Ralt RT1 no.74 was quick enough to overtake Klus in front of grandstand C (we have a photo of the action) only to get settled on second position after a couple of corners followed by a longer straight. The second race was then more or less calm and peaceful - unfortunately of 5 present Sports 2000 cc, only to took the challenge in this race, so we had more room to concentrate also on the present formula car photos.
Apart from these main historic races, also so called Young Timers had their races here. It was dominated by various Porsche 997 and 996 closely followed by Chevrolet Corvette Delago and Jaguar V8 Star and other almost 30 cars.
GT cars with the likes of Viper GTS-R, Corvette GT3, Mercedes-Benz SLS GT3, Audi R8 LMS, Lamborghini Gallardo, BMW Alpina B6, many Porsches, some BMW, Ferrari, KTM and even Pagani Zonda had their double race on Saturday and thus not present on Sunday at all, so final official race was for older generation of BMW 325i. A large field, some nice battles and even incident, but as a one make series race, it was not our cup of tea. A few photos anyway...
