Zolder this and that

30. September 2012Was it a preliminary decision in the Championship during the 9th race of the FIA European Truckracing Championship in Zolder, Belgium?
There was a failure on the steering on Antonio Albacete’s MAN (ESP) and his German brand mate Jochen Hahn was able to extend his advantage of 1 point to 21 – at the end of the day he even had 23 points. On the second day the Spaniard was able to catch up, but Hahn enters the last two race weekends with an advantage of 19 points.
In the last race of the weekend emotions were running high. Albacete got the feeling that he was being blocked by Mika Mäkinen and even after they had passed the finish line, the fight between the Fin and the Spaniard was not over. Both MAN race trucks quarreled again. After detailed interviews and a comprehensive analysis of the videos, the race commission gave Mäkinen a fine of 1.000 Euro in the end.
The whole attention is fixed on the championship and hardly anyone noticed that the champion of 2007, The Swiss Markus Bösiger, won his first race of the season. The head of MKR-Renault, Mario Kress, seemed happy that after Adam Lacko (CZE) and Markus Oestreich (GER) now his third driver finally won a place on the podium. However, Kress will not be happy with the course of the season. No one expected that after half of the season the MKR drivers didn’t had a real chance to win the title anymore.
That’s why MKR is already discussing the preparations for the next season, because the team does not conceal the fact that the last races had already been used as test runs. If every once in a while a Renault wins, it seems like they are not doing the wrong thing.
When the truckracers arrived in Zolder, the first thing they noticed were the pillars with huge solar panels which followed in the direction of the sun. Everyone admired the construction. However, this was soon over when the normal work began in the paddock. The water in paddock 1 would not drain, after it had been running into the tents of many teams. At this point many people stated that it would have been better to spend the money on a new drainage than on solar panels.
It was noticeable that nearly no big catering tents had been set up – except Renault Trucks. The PR work by the sponsors was rather small in Zolder. Still there was quite a number of spectators. There was no official number of spectators being announced, but the press office released an estimation of 12,000 on Sunday evening. Judged by the number of people that shoved through the paddock, it could have been even more.

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