Saturday in Donington – part 2

30. June 2012Donington - Shortly before the first race, Donington Park was hit by a rainstorm, but until the race started the sun had dried the race track. The MKR-Team repaired the steering on the Renault of Oestreich while standing in the grid. In the formation lap, however, the man from Fulda realized that the problem with the steering was still there – to be on the safe side, he turned into the pit lane right after the start. The Pole setter Hahn took the lead right away followed by Albacete, Lacko and Vrsecky. Kiss had passed Bösiger and Lacheze and was thus on place 5. However, not even one lap later not only the Swiss and the Frenchman had passed the Hungarian, but also Janiec. Kiss was on place 8 and was able to keep this position until the end of the race. The Frenchman Jeremy Robineau (MAN) placed 10th and scored the last point.
Up front there were no more changes, even though half way through the race, Albacete tried to take on the front runner Hahn. The man from the south of Germany defended his position and eventually drove a start-finish victory. The fight over the third place was even more exciting. Often times, Lacko and Vrsecky drove around the curves right next to each other, but Lacko was always a little bit ahead of him. The Renault driver was 14 hundredth faster than his Czech compatriot. The British Taylor played another interesting role in this race: After the bilious green truck had thwarted Albacete in the SuperPole, he shot passed Ellen Lohr in her Mercedes only a few meters behind the starting line. The German fell back, but took up the chase afterward. In the end she placed 16th in a group of 20 drivers.
In the second race of the day, Pole setter Kiss took the lead ahead of Janiec, who soon was passed by Lacheze and Vrsecky. Then Lacheze passed the Hungarian, while Janiec passed Vrsecky. Lacheze was able to pull clear even further and only few laps before the end of the race, he had 5 seconds advantage over Janiec and Kiss and the rest of the chase group, who had Vrsecky and Hahn on their tale. First, Vrsecky and then Hahn managed to pin down the Frenchman and later on the Hungarian. Lacheze suddenly slowed down and Vrsecky was able to not only catch up on the 5 second advantage in only 2 laps, but he also shot pass the French MAN driver and eventually won. Behind Lacheze, Hahn placed 3rd and therefore won a place on the podium. Kiss, Janiec and Albacete (who was able to win over Bösiger after a long fight) fought hard over the 4th place. In the last lap Kiss and Albacete started quarreling. Janiec was the one to laugh last, while both MAN drivers drove over the finish line in their trucks that were ravaged by the encounters – Albacete placed 6th and Kiss 7th. The last three places in the top-ten were won by the Englishman Matthew Summerfield (MAN), Robineau and Mäkinen. Due to his failure, Oestreich had to start from the back of the grid in the first race, but fought his way up to the 8th place after two thirds of the race until he was forced to quit.
Already in the first lap Rene Reinert (GER, MAN) and Lacko clashed violently and for the German the race was over immediately; for the Czech it was over 3 laps later.
In the end there were enough topics to discuss for the race commission that summoned 6 drivers and team managers. After a long time they announced that the results would stay the same, but they also said that there might still be changes concerning the starting grid for Sunday. In the overall ranking, Hahn (215) was able to pull clear of Albacete (206). Oestreich did not receive any points today and therefore remains on place number 4 with 140 points. Lacko (137), Vrsecky (111) and Bösiger (107) follow.

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