Sabine Schmitz

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Sabine Schmitz in front of the BMW M GmbH ring taxi

Sabine Schmitz (formerly married Reck , born May 14, 1969 in Adenau ) is a German racing driver and television presenter.

Life

As the daughter of a hotelier family from Nürburg , she grew up within the Nürburgring and drove the Nordschleife, which is open to the public, in her mother's car at an early age. In parallel to motor sports, she learned the profession of hotel specialist and sommelier . As Sabine Reck, she was married to a hotel owner and based in Pulheim . After the divorce, in the early 2000s, she ran the Fuchsröhre restaurant in Nürburg.

Sabine Schmitz has had a helicopter pilot's license since 2004 ; She has another hobby as a rider on her own horse. In addition to motorsport, she also runs the “Eifelranch am Ring” in Barweiler.

In 2020 Schmitz announced that he had had cancer since 2017.

Motorsport

In 1990 and 1991, she won three races of the Nürburgring circuit challenge held on the Nordschleife (until 2005: Castrol-HAUGG-Cup), in which people race against the clock. Then she drove in the BFGoodrich endurance championship . Like her sisters, she was active in the Ford Fiesta Mixed Cup , where she won the championship in 1992. Outside Germany, Schmitz was active in the Super Touring Car Cup in South Africa in 1995 and in sports car races in Brazil in 1999 .

In 1996, as Sabine Reck, she was the first woman to be included in the list of winners of an important all-day long-distance race at the Nürburgring 24 Hours . The success was achieved in the team of Johannes Scheid from neighboring Kottenborn , in a Group N - BMW M3 E36 3.2 liter. Again with Hannes Scheid, but now with Peter Zakowski and Hans-Jürgen Tiemann , she repeated this victory in 1997. In 1998, still with and with Hannes Scheid, she was the first woman to become champion in the VLN (organizer association Langstreckenpokal Nürburgring). After her, Claudia Hürtgen managed to do this .

After a few years of little activity, she and her partner, meat manufacturer and team sponsor Klaus Abbelen , are back on the Nürburgring with a competitive car. Schmitz drives a Porsche 997 GT3 Cup , which is used in the SP7 class without the restrictions of the Cup class. In 2008, together with Klaus Abbelen, Edgar Althoff and Kenneth Heyer in the Frikadelli -Porsche 911 GT3, she finished third in the overall ranking at the 24-hour race on the Nürburgring-Nordschleife , behind the winning cars from 2007 and 2006.

After a VLN race was canceled in September 2008, Schmitz / Abbelen competed in the Nürburgring circuit challenge the following weekend , where they achieved their fourth overall victory. Schmitz achieved the fastest lap time of 7:09 minutes that has ever been achieved in this competition with a naturally aspirated vehicle. She improved this time to 7:07 minutes in another race in the series.

In 2013 she started at the 41st ADAC Zurich 24h Race on the Nürburgring for the Frikadelli Racing Team in a Porsche 997 GT3R and finished with her team in 16th place.

In 2014, the ADAC 24h race at the Nürburgring finished after just 41 laps after a retirement (Frikadelli best time: 8: 21,536)

In 2015 her vehicle, the Frikadelli Porsche GT3 R, retired from the ADAC 24h race on the Nürburgring after completing 111 laps alongside Patrick Huisman, Patrick Pilet & Jörg Bergmeister and was not classified. (Best time Frikadelli: 8: 25.690)

In 2016 she competed in the ADAC 24h race on the Nürburgring for the Frikadelli Racing Team in the new Porsche 911 GT3 R (991) alongside Klaus Abbelen , Patrick Huisman & Norbert Siedler .

Ring taxi

According to her own estimates, she had covered around 20,000 laps on the Nordschleife by 2010, with an estimated increase of around 1200 per year.

This large number of laps is due not least to the ring taxi used by BMW , which she drove through the Nürburgring for many years until 2010. Customers can book a lap as passengers in a BMW M5 . Other well-known drivers of the ring taxi are Claudia Hürtgen and Hans-Joachim Stuck . Since 2010 she has been driving her own “Speedbee Racetaxi”, a Porsche GT3 RS.

Activities as a moderator

In 2002 Sabine Schmitz was seen for the first time on international television when she took Jeremy Clarkson with her in a ring taxi for the series Jeremy Clarkson: Meets the Neighbors . In 2004 she was again seen at Jeremy Clarkson's side, when she helped him to complete the Nordschleife in a Jaguar S-Type Diesel in under ten minutes. When Clarkson just barely made it, she said that she could manage that time in a van. In 2005, as part of another guest appearance at Top Gear, she finally actually tried to break the time set by Jeremy Clarkson in a Ford Transit , which, however, narrowly failed with a time of ten minutes and eight seconds.

Since September 2006 she has hosted the car magazine D Motor on the television channel DMAX together with Carsten van Ryssen and Tim Schrick , where she mainly appeared in spectacular racing duels (e.g. car versus helicopter or roller-skater). As part of her work as a presenter for D Motor , she and her colleagues had another guest appearance in the "Challenge Showdown" The British vs. The Germans in the 6th episode of the 11th season of Top Gear .

Since the beginning of 2011, she has presented the car magazine Turbo on Sport1 together with Tim Schrick . Since July 2014 she was seen together with Jumbo Schreiner in the tuning series Test my Ride on DMAX.

In February 2016, she was co-hosted by Chris Evans on the remake of Top Gear . She and Evans are supported by US actor Matt LeBlanc , former Formula 1 team owner Eddie Jordan and the two motor journalists Rory Reid and Chris Harris .

Web links

Commons : Sabine Schmitz  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Heiko Stritzke: Update Sabine Schmitz 2020: Cancer is back - racing break. In: motorsport-total.com. Motorsport total, July 19, 2020, accessed on July 20, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Speed-Magazin.de: 24h Nürburgring: Team Manthey Racing manages the hat trick On: www.speed-magazin.de . June 8, 2008, 8:00 p.m.
  3. ↑ RCN 6: First joint victory for Schmitz / Abbelen
  4. ↑ Top Gear: Sabine Schmitz's Nurburgring Van Challenge Part 2 - Top Gear - BBC. July 13, 2009, accessed February 14, 2016 .
  5. ↑ D Motor - The series on DMAX! -. (No longer available online.) In: DMAX.de. Archived from the original on February 15, 2016 ; Retrieved February 14, 2016 (American English).
  6. ↑ Eddie Jordan and Sabine Schmitz join Top Gear line-up - BBC News. In: BBC News. Retrieved February 14, 2016 (UK English).
personal data
SURNAME Schmitz, Sabine
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Reck, Sabine (meanwhile married)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German racing driver and presenter
DATE OF BIRTH May 14, 1969
PLACE OF BIRTH Adenau