This year brought with it not just a terrible virus but also the resurrection of a project BMW started back in the 1970s. The BMW Junior Team concept was brought back from the vault and with it came three young drivers that here hand-picked by BMW. The best part of it all was that the man who started the BMW Motorsport division as a whole, and who created the BMW Junior Team project in the first place, Jochen Neerpasch, is part of the effort.
Under his guidance, the three youngsters, Neil Verhagen, Max Hesse and Dan Harper got a chance to prove their worth in a variety of motorsport events. They first had to go through some physical training, were assessed both mentally and physically to make sure they are up to the task and moved in together near the Nurburgring, to be close to the action all the time. Then, the racing began.
They competed successfully in a variety of events but the most important one was, without a doubt, the Nurburgring 24-hour race held in September. This is where BMW managed to claim its 20th overall victory, at the 50th anniversary 24-hour Nurburgring endurance race. The youngsters were also among the many cars racing on the iconic track that day and they did good, under the careful guidance of Jochen Neerpasch.
2021 will be an even trickier year. BMW announced it will be dropping out of the DTM and Formula E so the avenues the BMW Junior Team members have to exploit moving on will be fewer. Nevertheless, they will get a chance to race in the GT3 cars soon which should give them a couple of options moving on. For now, they seem to have had a decent year, despite the Coronavirus setbacks we all had to deal with.
