Saturday at the Hungaroring Part 2 – Hahn extends his championship lead

16. June 2018Hungaroring - Lacko beat Hahn to the first corner, with Kiss, Smith, and the rest following in file. They crossed the finish line at the end of the first lap in pretty much the same order, and we could have been looking ahead to a procession rather than a race, given the performance parity across the top trucks and drivers. But then Smith lost ground on the finish straight, allowing Steffi Halm to skip ahead. A phalanx of four trucks, with Albacete, Lenz, and Reinert abreast of Smith, bore down on the first corner, which barely has space for two. Smith hit Albacete’s truck broadside. The two MANs, as conjoined, skidded off while the rest of the field swept past. As soon as the two disentangled they took up the chase again from the tail end of the field, but podium-place finishes were now out of the question.
But even Lacko in the lead had massive difficulties. He fell back a couple of places, and hobbled on in midfield with a punctured rear tyre. The way was clear for Hahn to take his third win in as many 20-points races, followed at a respectable distance by Kiss and Halm.
Everyone’s attention shifted to the contests for the remaining spots, most notably that for 8th, the finisher in that position getting to start Race 2 from pole.
Reinert was under no pressure and finished 4th, but had 10 seconds added to his time for overspeeding. That dropped him to 6th in the final classification.
Kursim and Lenz, who had fought hard over several laps, were thus promoted a place to 4th and 5th. Smith fought his way up peu à peu to finish 7th.
The coveted 8th was fought over till the last second. Brereton obviously had little chance against Lacko in an intact Freightliner, but now the Britisher held the Czech off as if his life depended on it, to claim the prized pole.
Albacete finished 10th behind the Buggyra pilot to take the final point on offer.

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