The Audi team Scherer Sport PHX can legitimately hope to have a say in the overall 24h victory in 2024, even without factory support from Ingolstadt and Neuburg. It would be the seventh triumph for the team from Meuspath at the Nürburgring, which is based just a few meters away from the Manthey EMA team. The team of former team boss Olaf Manthey has been the sole record holder at the 24h Nürburgring with those seven overall victories since 2021.
The competition from next door (Scherer PHX) is firmly convinced that it can equal the record. “We believe that we can win the race, otherwise we wouldn’t even be competing here,” said Christian Scherer, team owner of Scherer Sport PHX, the successor to Phoenix Racing around the retired team boss Ernst Moser, in an interview with Motorsport-Magazin.com.
The two racing cars have been in Scherer’s possession for a long time and are among the absolute top favorites in the hands of former Mercedes technical director Axel Randolph, Moser’s successor since the beginning of the year.
“Our planned deployment this year has been set since September 2023 – also because of the drivers (Ricardo Feller, Christopher Haase, Frank Stippler and Markus Winkelhock), who still have an Audi contract,” explained Scherer, who emphasized that Feller and Stippler also have a Scherer contract. “I have been working with both of them for a long time and am firmly convinced of their abilities.”
Scherer believes that this year’s driver line-up is even stronger than last year, when the two factory-supported Audi R8s were also among the favorites, but crashed in the early hours of the morning following an oil slick on the Grand Prix circuit and retired early.
Christian Scherer’s answer to the question of what will happen to his team in 2025 is exciting. The owner of twelve car dealerships says without hesitation: “We will definitely remain active here at the Ring, a decision as to which constellation has not yet been made,” stresses Scherer. “We are in talks with various manufacturers.” He also does not rule out another possible involvement with the Audi R8 LMS GT3 evo II, even without support from Neuburg.
The car is well-developed and capable of winning, as was emphatically demonstrated by Kelvin van der Linde’s DTM victory in an ABT Audi last weekend at the Lausitzring. The ABTs will also no longer receive any financial support from Audi this year because all programs outside of Formula 1 were canceled by those in charge in the middle of last year, which brought them a lot of criticism – not just within their own company.