Sunday in Barcelona

05. July 2009Barcelona - Thank goodness on Saturday evening the feared thunderstorm stayed away. And also during the warm-up this morning – again in bright sunshine – everything was under control: the leading foursome – Markus Bösiger and David Vrsecky in their Buggyras and the two MAN pilots Antonio Albacete and Jochen Hahn – again was at the top, split by just two tenths. The decisive timed practice again seemed to be characterized by tactical finesses. It was tremendously difficult to drive even one single lap without being obstructed some way or other. Albacete had a lucky hand and even cracked the magic 1:30 margin by clocking 1:29.835. Bösiger was less lucky and he was not at all happy with his first laps – he remained standing in the pit lane for several minutes. While his mechanics were working on the truck, his opponents marked best times. Not much better fared his team mate Vrsecky. While almost all the other drivers improved their times, the lap times of the two Buggyra pilots were slower than the ones they posted in the warm-up; they had to be content with 5th (Vrsecky) and 7th (Bösiger). Lining up behind Albacete were three more MAN pilots, Jochen Hahn Egon Allgäuer and Chris Levett. And between Vrsecky and Bösiger there was yet another MAN driver, Balazs Szobi. Certainly nobody would have expected to see such a starting grid formation.
By now the temperature was again around 33 °C (91 °F) and on the tarmac the temperature was even more than 48 °C (118 °F), nevertheless the pilots kept relatively cool at the start. After a neck and neck start Albacete emerged out of the first bend slightly ahead of his opponents. Allgäuer left Levett behind, Vrsecky was on fifth, Szobi lost 7 or 8 positions right at the start, and Frankie Vojtisek had passed Bösiger. Now everybody expected that it would be another start-finish victory for the Spaniard – especially in view of his predominance in the timed practice –, but Hahn had other ideas. The Swabian did not want to watch his MAN colleague win the race without putting up a fight – quite the contrary. And, much to the dismay of the 17,000 spectators, the German passed the Cepsa MAN of their local hero in the 5th lap. And from then on Hahn pulled away gradually, finishing comfortably by a margin of 6 seconds.
Meanwhile Vrsecky managed to pass Levett and Allgäuer, and then the Czech started to reel in Albacete, but although the Buggyra pilot attacked the Spaniard constantly, Albacete resisted all attempts by Vrsecky to overtake and crossed the finishing line in 2nd place, just a tenths ahead of the Czech. When, in the 5th lap, Bösigr eventually managed to pass the Renault of Vojtisek, he soon closed in on the two ‘fighting cocks’ Allgäuer and Levett. For several laps they drove bumper to bumper. In the course of several lapping manoeuvres Allgäuer succeeded in pulling away a bit, and in the 11th lap Bösiger managed to overtake Levett, too. A bit later the Swiss was already glued to the rear bumper of Allgäuer. But in the remaining laps he tried in vain to pass the Austrian, and finally crossed the line in fifth position, 3 tenth behind Allgäuer. Behind Levett, Vojtisek came out the winner of the team internal fight against Markus Altenstrasser, who consequently would be on pole in the second race. The most spectacular battle of the race was fought for 9th position between the four MAN pilots Alexander Lvov, Dominique Lachèze, Stuart Oliver and Szobi, who had dropped way back down the field at the start. And now he lost out, too, and eventually had to be content with 12th behind Oliver. Lvov and Lachèze secured the last two places in the points.
Meanwhile the temperature on the tarmac had risen to 52 °C (125 °F), and hotly contested was also the leading position at the start of the second race. The first row was occupied by the two Renault drivers, Altenstrasser and Vojtisek. Behind them were Levett and Bösiger, followed by Allgäuer, ‘Vrsecky, Albacete and Hahn. And right in the first turn there were several trucks coming together. Allgäuer’s truck remained stranded, and it took some time for Bösiger to rejoin the track, but suddenly the Swiss found himself placed ahead of the two leading red Renaults. And then there was another serious collision. Severely damaged the trucks of Altenstrasser and Vojtisek slowed down considerably and eventually were forced to retire.
Meanwhile Vrsecky was leading, followed by Bösiger who, however, was one lap behind. The two Buggyras gradually pulled away and Vrsecky took his truck to an unchallenged victory. In the penultimate lap Bösiger drove into the pit lane and now the optical order was restored, too. In the last few laps Albacete constantly had to fend off Hahn’s attacks, but the German never had a real chance to pass. But, after all, it was only about one additional point – no reason to risk pushing each other off the track. Levett finished in fourth, ahead of Szobi, Lachèze, Anthony Janiec and Javier Mariezcurrena. The top ten were completed by Lvov and Jean-Pierre Blaise.
Later there were lengthy discussions about the race and the collisions. Bösiger was disqualified due to ignoring the blue flags.
In the overall ranking Albacete is still leading with 249 points, followed by Vrsecky (227), Bösiger (187), Hahn (171), Allgäuer (106) and Levett (100).
In the team ranking the first race was again won by Buggyra (Bösiger / Vrsecky)
ahead of Team HahnOxxo (Hahn / Szobi) and Bird’s Bernau (Levett / Lachèze).
In the second race the winner was Team HahnOxxo, followed by Bird`s Bernau and Buggyra.