The 2009 Nürburgring 24 hour race is now well underway with over 10 hours of racing gone. At the head of the pack the #1 Manthey Porsche RSR is currently looking good for a fourth consecutive outright win. Of course, there is a long way to go yet, so let’s focus on the Australian teams.

There are still 168 cars listed as still running. In the first couple of hours of the race the #29 VIP Petfoods entry was as high as 6th outright. Tony Quinn’s team has some enduro success behind them with a win in the Dubai 24 hour in January 2008. At the moment they are in 16th outright and 4th in class (SP 7).

I received a text message from Stu Jones about 30 minutes ago saying, “All good. Weather fine and only a moderate amount of debris and crashes on track. Lots of smoke from fireworks and campers.”

Below is the full list of Aussies, sourced from the Results Database on the official website.

13th overall – 10:10:46.878 elapsed time – 62 laps – 4 behind leader
#10 – MSC Adenau – BMW E46 M3 GTS – Class SP 7
Rodney Forbes (AUS), Jörg Viebahn (D), Marko Hartung (D), Duncan Huisman (NED)

16th overall – 10:13:38.462 elapsed time – 62 laps – 4 behind leader
#29 – VIP Petfoods – Porsche 997 RSR – Class SP 7
Tony Quinn (AUS), Klark Quinn (AUS), Craig Baird (NZ), Grant Denyer (AUS)

56th overall – 10:12:59.179 elapsed time – 56 laps – 10 behind leader
#44 – Mal Rose Racing – Holden Commodore – Class SP 8
Mal Rose (AUS), Peter Leemhuis (AUS), Tony Alford (AUS)

71st overall – 10:11:05.894 elapsed time – 54 laps – 12 behind leader
#48 – BMW E46 M3 – Class SP 6
Guy Povey (GB), Graham Coomes (GB), Denis Cribbin (AUS), Alan Shepherd (AUS)

73rd overall – 10:12:57.312 elapsed time – 54 laps – 12 behind leader
#136 – VW Golf V TDI – Class D1 T
Eberhard Rattunde (D), Maurice O’Reilly (NZ), Wayne Moore (NZ), Heinrich Immig (D)

78th overall – 10:08:34.591 elapsed time – 53 laps – 13 behind leader
#170 – BMW E46 M3 – Class V5
Richard Gartner (AUS), Ray Stubber (AUS), Paul Stubber (AUS)

95th overall – 10:11:05.894 elapsed time – 51 laps – 15 behind leader
#48 – Brunswick Automotive – BMW 130i – Class SP 5
Ric Shaw (AUS), Steve Borness (AUS), Anthony Robson (AUS), Robert Rubis (AUS)

100th overall – 10:02:39.736 elapsed time – 50 laps – 16 behind leader
#13 – Osborne Motorsports – Toyota Corolla – Class SP 3
Colin Osborne (AUS), Stu Jones (AUS)