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Veranstaltergemeinschaft Langstreckenpokal Nürburgring (English: The Association of Nürburgring Endurance Cup Organisers) are the organisers of a ten-race series held on the Nürburgring Nordschleife. It was renamed to "BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft (BFGLM)", or BFGoodrich Endurance Championship, in 2001.
The VLN series is closely associated with the 24 Hours Nürburgring, as it has similar rules (again), and mainly the same participants. In the calendar, several weeks around the 24h date in May/June are taken off to allows teams to prepare for the 24h, and to fix their cars afterwards. The 24h is not part of the championship anymore, though.
The organisation was founded in 1977 to join the efforts of ten Motorsport-Clubs, which are members of ADAC or Deutscher Motorsportverband (DMV). Previously, each club had run its own touring car racing event on the Nürburgring, lasting for 3.5 to 6 hours, with about 150 cars and 400 drivers taking part. The rules were unified and the races were made part of a series. The winners of the series were awarded a Cup (German Pokal), sponsored by Veedol lubrication products. Due to this, both were simply called "Veedol-Cup" for many years. Since the change of sponsorship and it the official recognition by Deutscher Motor Sport Bund (DMSB) as the German endurance championship (German Meisterschaft) in 2001, the former Veedol Langstreckenpokal Nürburgring is now the BFGoodrich Langstreckenmeisterschaft Nürburgring. The name of the VLN organisation stays the same, though, which is reflected by their website addresses and title.
Each VLN race is held as a "one day event" on Saturdays only, in order to limit costs. The drivers briefing is at 7:45, practice is from 8:30 to 10:00. The race starts at 12:00. After parc fermé is opened and the winners are honoured, the teams can travel home on race day. At some events, the schedule also accommodates additional sprint races of visiting other series, mainly Classic cars and Youngtimers.
The "6 hours" are considered the season highlight – in 1998, even Sir Jack Brabham took part, at age 72. Here, 2 to 4 drivers per cars are entered, while in all others races, a single driver can drive all alone for 4 hours, or up to 3 can form a team. Another highlight is the last race, also called "Schinkenrennen", as large pieces of Ham from the Münsterland area are presented to the winners of the various classes, to the delight of the hungry team members.
Participants of VLN races range from amateurs in small road legal cars with rollcages and harnesses to professional factory teams racing ex-DTM cars, or Porsche 996 GT3 RSR as in the 24 Hours of Le Mans and similar races.
Apart from the 24 Hours, the Rundstrecken Challenge Nürburgring (RCN/CHC) and GLP are related smaller events dedicated to non-professionals.
Classes
A variety of cars compete at the same time during each race. In the 2009 season, there were 30 classes of cars in four divisions.
The Series Cars division is intended to allow relatively low cost racing with near-series cars. It consists of six gasoline classes differentiated by engine displacement V1 to V6 and a diesel class VD.
The Specials division consists of pure race cars that may compete in other race series. It consists of the classes SP1 to SP8 differentiated by engine displacement with an optional suffix T for turbo charged engines, the SP9 class for FIA GT3 cars, the SP10 class for SRO GT4 cars, the special E1-XP 2009 class and the D1T to D4T classes differentiated by engine displacement for diesel cars.
The Cup division consists of one-make cup cars in the classes Cup1: Seat Leon, Cup2: Honda Civic R, Cup3: Porsche Carrera Cup.
The H division consists of cars made in 1996 and before. It consists of the classes H1 to H4 differentiated by engine displacement.
2005 Season
In 2005, Claudia Hürtgen became champion, driving a WTCC-spec. BMW 320i.
2006 Calendar
| Date |
Event |
Distance |
Overall Winner |
| 21.01.2006 |
VLN Celebration of 2005 winners |
|
Claudia Hürtgen |
| 18.03.2006 |
VLN test session |
|
|
| 25.03.2006 |
55. ADAC-Westfalenfahrt |
4 Hours |
(cancelled due to snow) |
| 08.04.2006 |
31. DMV-4-Stunden Rennen |
4 Hours |
Porsche 996 |
| 22.04.2006 |
48. ADAC-ACAS-H&R-Cup |
4 Hours |
Porsche 996 |
| 20.05.2006 |
37. Adenauer ADAC Rundstrecken-Trophy |
4 Hours |
Porsche 996 |
| 15.-18.06.2006 |
34. ADAC Zürich 24h-Rennen |
24 Hours |
Porsche 996 |
| 08.07.2006 |
46. ADAC-Reinoldus Langstreckenrennen |
4 Hours |
Porsche 996 |
| 29.07.2006 |
29. RCM-DMV-Grenzlandrennen |
4 Hours |
Porsche 996 |
| 26.08.2006 |
6h ADAC Ruhr-Pokal-Rennen |
6 Hours |
BMW M3 V8 (Team Getrag) |
| 30.09.2006 |
38. ADAC-Barbarossapreis |
3½ Hours |
Porsche 996 |
| 14.10.2006 |
30. DMV-250 Meilen Rennen |
4 Hours |
Porsche 996 |
| 28.10.2006 |
31. DMV-Münsterlandpokal |
4 Hours |
Porsche 996 |
Member organisations
See also
External links
