Sunday in Most Part 1 - Pole for local favourite Lacko

03. September 2017Most - Summer’s still only formally on the calendar at this 6th round of the FIA European Truck Racing Championship at Autodrom Most. The sun was hidden for the most part, and the temperatures wouldn’t climb out of the low double digits. But, thankfully, it was dry.
First up on the agenda was warm-up. In these 15 minutes there’s obviously no telling who’s flat out, who’s only testing the waters, and who’s really just getting their truck’s juices in circulation. Adam Lacko in the #55 Buggyra Freightliner was the only driver to go under 2:03s.
At the start of qualifying an hour and a quarter later the sun peered out tentatively through the clouds. A more cheerful scene to behold, but that didn’t make it any warmer out of doors.
Norbert Kiss in the #24 tankpool24 Mercedes drove the fastest flying lap, a 2:03.160 that was, nevertheless, slower than Lacko’d gone in warm-up. Reigning champion Jochen Hahn took exactly one hundredth more in his Iveco, with Lacko a further tenth behind. The times at the top were very close, followed by a big gap to those who were at the last couple of Top 10 spots. Thus confident that they’d made it into the Super Pole, most were back in pit lane after just one hot lap – after all, their tyres would have to last the Super Pole and two full race distances.
In addition to the three aforementioned, the others who qualified for the shootout were an MAN quartet consisting of Antonio Albacete (ESP), Ryan Smith (GBR), Sascha Lenz, and Steffi Halm (both GER), the two Czechs David Vršecký (Buggyra Freightliner) and Frankie Vojtíšek (MAN), and German Iveco pilot Gerd Körber as 10th.
At the start of Super Pole 2 Lacko instantly recorded a 2:02.085, Hahn checking in two tenths slower. But the Czech was still a microtick over a hundredth off Hahn’s best in yesterday’s Super Pole, leaving scope for an improvement.
After a cooling-off lap the truck racers laid it all on the line again. Lacko could go no quicker, and Hahn just couldn’t get a clean lap. The eight remaining qualifiers did manage better times, though only marginally. So there was no change in the order.
Polesitter Lacko and Hahn were followed by Albacete, Halm, Kiss, Smith, Vršecký, Körber, and Vojtíšek on rows two through five on the grid for Race 3.

Impressions: