Pierre Kaffer

Pierre Kaffer

Nation:	Germany
DTM
First race:	Hockenheim I 2005
Last race:	Hockenheim II 2006
Teams (manufacturers)
2005 Joest • 2006 Phoenix (all Audi )
statistics
Starts Victories Poles SR 21st - - -
Podiums:	-
Overall wins:	-
Points:	6th

Pierre Kaffer (born November 7, 1976 in Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler ) is a German automobile racing driver .

Life

Beginnings in motorsport

Pierre Kaffer completed an apprenticeship as a car mechanic . In 1990 Kaffer started karting and joined Formula Ford in 1994 , won this German Championship in 1995 and finished the European Championship in second place. In 1996 he switched to Formula Opel and also won the Cup of Nations there. From 1997 to 2001 he drove in the German Formula 3 championship and won 12 races for the Formula 3 DM, took 8 pole positions and was able to win the 1st run at the Formula 3 World Final 2000 in Macau. In the absence of sponsorship money, Kaffer did not make the leap into Formula 3000, although the successes in the previous series spoke for him.

Porsche brand cups

Therefore, he switched to the Porsche Carrera Cup Deutschland in 2002 and was able to show his driving talent in the first championship run in Hockenheim , after pole position and a start-finish victory. At the end of the season he was third. In 2003, in addition to the Formula 3 World Finals and the Carrera Cup, he drove his first season in the Porsche Supercup , where he was able to show two overall victories at the end of the year. Kaffer finished this championship, which was also strong, as third. As a reward for his achievements in the 2003 season, he received two test sessions in the American Champ Car series for team owner Bobby Rahal , who offered Kaffer a cockpit for 2004.

Works driver at Audi

Pierre Kaffer in the Audi A4, 2006 in the DTM

Kaffer refused and switched to Audi Sport as a works driver. His greatest successes in motorsport in 2004 were victories at the 12-hour races in Sebring and the 1000 km race on the Nürburgring in an Audi R8 . In the same year he also drove the 24 Hours of Le Mans alongside Frank Biela and Allan McNish , although after just a few hours, after a serious accident with the Scot McNish, he had to finish the race alone with Frank Biela. In 2006, Pierre Kaffer was nominated as a substitute driver for the 24 Hours of Le Mans by Audi, but was not used.

In 2005 he was active in the DTM for Audi Sport Team Joest, and in 2006 he contested his second DTM season for Audi Sport Team Phoenix, in which, as in 2005, he drove a car from the previous year. Kaffer achieved his best DTM result at round two of the 2005 DTM season , when he finished fifth at the EuroSpeedway Lausitz .

Sports car

In 2007 , Kaffer ended his engagement with Audi and starts again in the Porsche Carrera Cup together with Christoph Langen for the Schnabl Engineering team.

Pierre Kaffer in the Ferrari F430 GTC at the 2008 Silverstone 1000 km race

In 2008, together with Armin Hahne and Christian Haarmann and Jochen Krumbach in the Manthey Racing team's Porsche 996 GT3-MR, he finished second in the overall standings at the 24-hour race on the Nürburgring-Nordschleife . Furthermore, he was on the GT2 podium at the Le Mans 24-hour race in 2008 with his team-mates Pierre Ehret and Lars-Erik Nielsen . All in all, he was able to bring his driving talent to the Grand-Am , ALMS and LMS. After a successful test in the Japanese Super GT championship , he also received an invitation for a race as a guest starter, but had to cancel due to a scheduling conflict.

In 2009 Pierre Kaffer started for the Ferrari works team Risi Competizione together with Jaime Melo in the American Le Mans Series on a Ferrari F430 GTC . The team was also supported by Mika Salo for the Sebring 12 Hours, the Le Mans 24 Hours and the American Petit Le Mans , who also won the trio of drivers. The ALMS season ended for Kaffer in second place in the GT2 classification. In the LMS he started for the Hankook Farnbacher Team in 2009, as in the previous year, in a Ferrari F430 and was able to secure the first pole position for the team at the Nürburgring. For the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring, he was signed up for this one race by Audi and finished the race together with Christian Abt , Lucas Luhr and Jean-François Hemroulle as the best audit team in second place overall.

In the 2010 season, Pierre Kaffer won the International GT Open Series in a Ferrari F430 GTC together with Alvaro Barba. The vehicle was used by the Italian AF Corse team. Pierre also competed in the Le Mans Series for the English CRS team in a Ferrari F430 GTC. For Risi Competizione he also took part in the American Le Mans Series in the two long-distance classics Sebring and Petit Le Mans. He was also registered with Risi in the Le Mans 24-hour race. He finished the season opener in Sebring together with Jaime Melo and Gianmaria Bruni as the GT2 class winner. This means that Kaffer has always successfully completed the championship run with three participations.

Since the 2011 season he has been driving again in a sports prototype in the LMP2 category for the Argentine Pecom Racing Team. In the 2011 season, the team used a Lola Judd LMP2 prototype in the European Le Mans Series. At the start of the season, Pierre finished 2nd in Le Castellet. For the AF Corse Team, Pierre contested the 12-hour race in Sebring and the 12-hour race in Road Atlanta together with Giancarlo Fisichella and Gianmaria Bruni in a Ferrari F458. He won the race at Road Atlanta with his teammates.

In the 2012 season, the Pecom Racing Team had entered one vehicle each in the European Le Mans Series and in the FIA ​​WEC. The 2012 newly founded FIA WEC World Sports Car Championship, Pierre and his teammates finished in third place in the LMP2 class. With U. a. a world championship race win in Bahrain, a 3rd place at the 24 Hours of Le Mans and a 2nd place at the World Championship race in Sao Paulo, the team celebrated some successes with the Oreca LMP2. At the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring, Pierre drove a Mercedes SLS in third place in the overall standings. In the 2013 season Pierre was able to win the World Championship run in Spa Francorchamps, a 2nd place at the World Championship run in Austin and 2 × a 3rd place at the World Championship runs in Silverstone and Sao Paulo.

In the 2014 season he took part in the North American TUSC (formerly ALMS) for Risi Competizione on a Ferrari F458 GTLM. Together with his team-mate Giancarlo Fisichella he won the 2nd race of the GT class a. a. in Road America and the Virginia Grand Prix even as overall winner. He successfully finished the 24-hour race on the Nürburgring together with Felix Baumgartner, Frank Biela and Marco Werner in the top 10. Almost 10 years after his last appearance in an LMP1 prototype, he contested the last 4th races of the FIA ​​WEC sports car world championship for the new Lotus LMP1 team. At the season highlight of the sports car world championship, the 24 Hours of Le Mans, Pierre drove a factory Ferrari F458 of the AF Corse Team.

In the 2015 season, Pierre is again driving the full season of the North American TUSC Series for the Risi Team and trying to win the championship of the GTLM category with his tried and tested team-mate Giancarlo Fisichella. He is also starting again for the ByKolles Team (formerly Lotus) in the FIA ​​WEC Sports Car World Championship on an LMP1 prototype, the highest league of sports cars.

At the 43rd ADAC Zurich 24h Race at the Nürburgring 2015, Pierre Kaffer with an Audi R8 LMS and his team mates Nicki Thiim , Flensburg, Christer Jöns , Ingelheim, finished 7th in the overall class.

With the number 1, he also took part in the 44th ADAC Zurich 24h race at the Nürburgring together with Christopher Mies , Nico Müller and Laurens Vanthoor , again on an Audi R8 LMS (2016).

The 24-hour race at the Nurburgring in 2019 won the team Phoenix along with teammate Frank Stippler , Dries Vanthoor and Frédéric Vervisch with an Audi R8 LMS .

Personal

Pierre Kaffer has lived in Salenstein , Switzerland , since 2004 .

statistics

Le Mans results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
2004	Audi Sport UK Team Veloqx	Audi R8	Allan McNish	Frank Biela	Rank 5
2008	Farnbacher Racing	Ferrari F430 GTC	Lars-Erik Nielsen	Pierre Ehret	Rank 23
2009	Risi Competizione	Ferrari F430 GTC	Jaime Melo	Mika Salo	18th place and class win
2010	Risi Competizione	Ferrari F430 GTC	Jaime Melo	Gianmaria Bruni	failure	Engine failure
2011	PeCom Racing	Lola B11 / 40	Luís Pérez Companc	Matias Russo	failure	malfunction
2012	PeCom Racing	Oreca 03	Luís Pérez Companc	Soheil Ayari	Rank 9
2013	PeCom Racing	Oreca 03	Luís Pérez Companc	Nicolas Minassian	Rank 11
2014	AF Corse	Ferrari 458 Italia GT2	Davide Rigon	Olivier Beretta	failure	Engine failure
2015	Team ByKolles	CLM P1 / 01	Simon Trummer	Tiago Monteiro	disqualified
2016	Team ByKolles	CLM P1 / 01	Simon Trummer	Oliver Webb	failure
2017	Risi Competizione	Ferrari 488 GTE	Toni Vilander	Giancarlo Fisichella	failure	accident

Sebring results

year	team	vehicle	Teammate	Teammate	Teammate	placement	Failure reason
2004	Audi Sport UK Team Veloqx	Audi R8	Frank Biela	Allan McNish		Overall victory
2009	Risi Competizione	Ferrari F430 GTC	Jaime Melo	Mika Salo		Rank 7 and class win
2010	Risi Competizione	Ferrari F430 GTC	Jaime Melo	Gianmaria Bruni		Rank 6 and class win
2011	AF Corse	Ferrari F430 GTC	Giancarlo Fisichella	Gianmaria Bruni		Rank 15
2012	PeCom Racing	Oreca 03	Luís Pérez Companc	Soheil Ayari		Rank 7
2013	DragonSpeed ​​Mishumotors	Oreca FLM09	Mirco Schultis	Patrick Simon		Rank 35
2014	Starworks Motorsport	Riley MkXXVI	Alex Popov	Scott Mayer	Sebastián Saavedra	failure	malfunction
2015	Risi Competizione	Ferrari 458 Italia GTC	Giancarlo Fisichella	Andrea Bertolini		Rank 11
2016	Krohn Racing	Audi R8 LMS ultra	Niclas Jönsson	Tracy Krohn		Rank 36

Individual results in the DTM

season	team	Manufacturer	1	2	3	4th	5	6th	7th	8th	9	10	11	Points	rank
2005	Joest Racing	Audi	HO1	LA1	SPA	BRN	OSC	NOR	ONLY	ZAN	LA2	IS	HO2	5	15th
			13	5	14th	12	17th	8th	18th	11	DNF	DNF	10
2006	Team Phoenix	Audi	HO1	LAU	OSC	BRH	NOR	ONLY	ZAN	BAR	LEM	HO2		1	16.
			DNF	10	10	9	8th	14th	9	DNF	12	DNF

Legend
colour	abbreviation	meaning
gold	-	victory
silver	-	2nd place
bronze	-	3rd place
green	-	Placement in the points
blue	-	Classified outside the point ranks
violet	DNF	Race not finished (did not finish)
	NC	not classified
red	DNQ	did not qualify
	DNPQ	failed in pre-qualification (did not pre-qualify)
black	DSQ	disqualified
White	DNS	not at the start (did not start)
	WD	withdrawn
Light Blue	PO	only participated in the training (practiced only)
	TD	Friday test driver
without	DNP	did not participate in the training (did not practice)
	INJ	injured or sick
	EX	excluded
	DNA	did not arrive
	C.	Race canceled
		no participation in the World Cup
other	P / bold	Pole position
	SR / italic	Fastest race lap
	*	not at the finish, but counted due to the distance covered
	()	Streak results
	underlined	Leader in the overall standings

Web links

Commons : Pierre Kaffer  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Official website

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Speed-Magazin.de: 24h Nürburgring: Team Manthey Racing manages the hat trick On: www.speed-magazin.de . June 8, 2008, 8:00 p.m.