If you would like a Porsche 911 to set a lap document, Jörg Bergmeister is your man
What hits you is the spooky matter-of-factness. The unadorned supply of a shocking statement earlier than transferring on indifferently. Very demure, very conscious, very German racing driver.
“The factor is,” says Jörg Bergmeister sotto voce, sitting at a aspect desk throughout the current launch occasion for the up to date Porsche 911 GT3 at Hockenheim, “that on a lap like this, you’re pushing tougher than even in qualifying.”
I’m nonetheless questioning exactly how that might be attainable when the coup de grâce lands: “As a result of it doesn’t matter if the automotive doesn’t come again.”
There tends to be a golden nugget in each interview, and within the case of JB chatting about his hectic life as a Porsche growth gun, that is absolutely it. Bergmeister, the Nürburgring, demise or glory probably for man, definitely for machine.
The 6ft 4in economics grad, who for many years raced and gained in all method of competitors 911s, has been a model ‘ambassador’ for a while and remains to be within the thick of it.
The car-loving public know of his exploits as a result of when Porsche proudly publishes a ’Ring time for a brand new product, it’s usually Bergmeister who did the legwork. Journalists know him as a result of, in some unspecified time in the future, if we’re fortunate, we’d discover ourselves using shotgun as he seemingly rips up physics.
Porsche wheels JB out usually. It could be a Carrera GTS launch at Palm Springs or GT3 RS at Silverstone however the present is identical: beautiful financial system of motion and trail-braking so acute that JB is just getting caught into the pedal on the level when most of us could be rolling off it.
Nevertheless, the blood-chilling “doesn’t come again” remark pertains to a solo enterprise, which was the Nordschleife lap-time try for the present GT3 RS, again in 2022.
On the day, Bergmeister conjured a 6min 50.7sec and it was sufficient to drastically please everybody, together with the higher-ups. However not the softly spoken, often smiling 48-year-old, who felt he might crack 6min 50sec by turning into Tiergarten kind of flat at 285kph, if solely large boss Andy Preuninger was blissful to danger shedding the chassis. (Reader, he was.)
The thought alone will elicit a nervous snort from anyone who is aware of the Nordschleife. Tiergarten, an uphill kink, is the sting within the tail of the limitless Döttinger Höhe straight.
Within the quest for a white-hot lap time, it’s the denouement, a second of make or break price committing to provided that you’ve nailed each apex, each shift and carried each drop of momentum by way of the previous 20km. And even then.
So sure, there may be stress. And no, JB doesn’t raise. However if you happen to watch the sensational on-board footage, you’ll see that on the entry to Tiergarten the brake hint burbles up a contact and JB loses 5kph. So what precisely is occurring right here?
Through the testing seasons on the Nürburgring, Bergmeister stays on the Dorint resort and has dinner with the engineers three or so nights every week. It’s throughout these evenings that a number of the juiciest developmental concepts are dreamed up and mentioned.
For the aero-festooned ‘992’ GT3 RS, one such thought was that the driving force ought to be capable of slap shut the flap within the DRS-style rear wing even when at full throttle. However how you can do it?
There have been, says JB, merely no spare buttons left on the steering wheel, what with all of the dials for damper charges, and there additionally already being a button to open the DRS.
So as an alternative, at excessive velocity, you possibly can shut the flap by feathering the brake pedal along with your left foot, being cautious to do it evenly sufficient that you don’t provoke the assembly of pad and disc.
“You simply tip the brake,” says Bergmeister, “so that you’re already handing over to the nook on excessive downforce, principally.”
Naturally JB did the enterprise and his 6min 49.3sec time is testomony to each the scope of a real road-racing 911 and an inspiring show of dedication and ability in a one-take state of affairs.
Simply as fascinating is his brutal schedule. Through the testing season, Bergmeister travels from his house close to Düsseldorf to Nürburg, the place he stays throughout the week.
A day’s work can comprise as much as 30 laps, that are all flat out as a result of whenever you’re engaged on set-up, something much less means “you don’t get a correct learn, so that they’re all the time high-risk laps”.
On a load-collecting programme, stints are lengthy, although even two laps is quarter-hour of pure focus and large bodily bombardment within the case of the GT3 RS, with its near-900kg of downforce.
To do that yr after yr, you fairly actually must be one of the crucial expert and most secure pairs of fingers within the enterprise, but I can’t resist asking: Jörg, are you a risk-taker? “When it comes right down to it, sure.”
