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Saturday at the Smolenskring

Saturday at the Smolenskring

30. July 2011Smolenskring - Already early in the morning it was bright and sunny with an almost cloudless sky which promised another blazing hot summer day. The truck racers meanwhile geared down in the literal sense as well as figuratively – perhaps more than they would have preferred, because in the very first lap of the first free practice the Renault of Adam Lacko (CZE) belched out huge clouds of white smoke, which indicated turbo failure. And as the RaceTruck was stranded in a rather dangerous position, the practice session was red-flagged. Finally the Renault was towed off the track, but the schedule was already upset considerably. The truck racers remained totally undeterred by that incident and afterwards clocked one best lap time after another. Finally MAN pilot Uwe Nittel (GER) claimed fastest lap time, with his Spanish MAN colleague Antonio Albacete posting 2nd fastest time. And also in the second free practice the two pilots in the Truck Sport Bernau team set the fastest lap times, but this time the order was reversed.
Tough luck for Florian Orsini – towards the end of the free practice the Mercedes of the young Frenchman suffered a burst turbo charger, so that he could not take part in the timed practice.
By that time the organisers had made up leeway by shortening the duration of the break, and a planned opening ceremony was cancelled due to the time pressure.
But it seemed that in the timed practice they wanted to save time, too, which wouldn’t make much sense, because it lasts 15 minutes anyway, but yet almost all the pilots were content with only one timed lap, because they were quite certain that they would make it into the top ten. Only Stuart Oliver (GBR) in his yellow MAN, who did two laps, and the French Renault pilot Anthony Janiec, who even had four tries, stayed a bit longer on the track, because those two pilots fought for the final position in the SuperPole with the Brit finally coming out as winner.
And in the SuperPole Albacete continued where he had left off before, and clocked absolutely fastest lap time (1:51.741m). And it was a bit surprising that Buggyra pilot David Vrsecky secured 2nd place on the grid ahead of MAN pilot Jochen Hahn (GER) – so far the most successful driver this season – who was almost half a second slower than the pole setter. Behind them the grid order was as follows: Nittel, the Swiss driver Markus Bösiger (Renault), Lacko, Buggyra pilot Chris Levett (GBR), local hero Alex Lvov (RUS), Oliver, and Markus Oestreich (Renault) whose fastest lap times had been cancelled. Janiec lined up on 11th, followed by Orsini, whose truck had been repaired in time for the race, and the Spanish pilot José Bermejo (MAN).
In the usual frantic scramble at the start – especially in the first bend of the Smolenskring – Hahn came out as winner. He was soon clearly pulling away from his chasers Albacete and Vrsecky. Behind them – also in the first bend – local hero Lvov managed to slice past 4 rivals to move up to 4th position. Bösiger was directly behind the Russian and seemed to be clearly faster, but he saw no opportunity to pass the yellow MAN, so that the distance between the Swiss driver and the leading trio became increasingly larger. Eventually he succeeded in passing Lvov and Nittel wanted to follow suit, but collided with the Russian – an incident with far-reaching consequences. Lvov went through the gravel bed, Nittel incurred a drive-through penalty, and both drivers dropped back considerably. Meanwhile Hahn had managed to pull away from his chasers and you would have thought that he was on his way to another win, but suddenly Albacete started to reel in the German. The black MAN started to falter and the Spaniard seized the opportunity to take the lead and eventually claimed an unexpected victory. The final podium spot was taken by Vrsecky; Bösiger had to settle for the unrewarding 4th position, followed by Lacko and Oestreich. Oliver finished in 7th and Levett came home 8th, thus securing pole in the second race where the top 8 finishers from race 1 line up on the starting grid in reverse order. The remaining two positions within the points were taken by Lvov and Nittel.
Shortly before the start of the second race there was a bit of a turmoil. Several teams had not yet managed to fill the tanks for the brake cooling system with the necessary amount of water – which is 200 litres or even more. Several people tried to add more water while the trucks were already lined up on the grid, among them Chris Levett. But in spite of that it turned out that the British driver had his absolutely best race of the season. Right from the start he took the lead which he held for two thirds of the race. But it has to be said that he also benefitted from the fact that Oliver had his hands full fending off his chasers Oestreich, Lacko and Bösiger, who were clearly faster. It took Oestreich five laps to pass Oliver. The Renault pilot then mounted an attack on the frontrunner and finally he left Levett behind, too. But what you would not have expected – Oestreich’s truck had already used up all the water for the brakes and crossed the finish line “on its last leg”. When the Renault came to a halt, they immediately had to continue cooling the brakes with water. And as there was the risk that the tyres caught fire, the marshals had several fire extinguishers ready.
But in the meantime there were a lot of other things going on on the track. Already in lap 2 Albacete was forced to return to the pit as some metal part had damaged the radiator, so that the Spaniard’s MAN lost all its cooling water. Prior to that Orsini had had to strike his colours, and also Lacko had to retire due to mechanical failure.
As Bösiger slowed down, too, Vrsecky snatched away 4th position from the Swiss. Nittel finished in 6th, but before that, in the very last bend, he had gotten into a tussle with Bösiger which sent the truck of the German spinning. Hahn brought his truck home in 7th, followed by Janiec, Lvov, and Bermejo who secured his first championship point this season.
Later on, long after the end of the race, the final results were announced. Because of the incident with Nittel, Bösiger incurred a 10-second penalty which dropped him back behind the MAN pilot, but Nittel was penalised, too. The German pilot is now under observation for the next 6 races, and, if the worst comes to the worst, he will be excluded.
With 260 points Hahn is still clearly leading in the overall ranking, followed by Albacete (217), Oestreich (174), Nittel (151), Vrsecky (148), Lacko (145) and Bösiger (128).
The team ranking in the first race was won by Cepsa-Trucksport Lutz Bernau (Albacete / Nittel) ahead of Buggyra (Vrsecky / Levett) und MKR-Technology (Bösiger / Oestreich). The winner in the second race was MKR, followed by Buggyra and Cepsa-Trucksport Lutz Bernau.

Impressions:

Saturday at the Smolenskring
Saturday at the Smolenskring
Saturday at the Smolenskring
Saturday at the Smolenskring
Saturday at the Smolenskring
Saturday at the Smolenskring