Sunday in Zolder Part 3 - First win of the season for José Rodrigues

16. September 2018Zolder - Shortly before the trucks moved into formation for the start of Race 4, the result of the previous race was revised. The stewards didn’t find Kiss’s attacks in the fight for 4th place acceptable, and so slapped 30 seconds on the Hungarian in place of a drive-through penalty. The Mercedes pilot dropped to 12th in the classification, promoting the seven drivers behind him by one position. That meant José Rodrigues was now on pole, and Anderson could collect one point for P10.
If anything, the punishment only goaded Kiss to yet another famous display of the art of the overhaul, as he stormed up to P7 in the first couple of hundred metres. There, his further advance was blocked by Lacko, the defending champ showing no willingness whatsoever to be overtaken.
At the front, Rodrigues effortlessly launched into the lead, though at this point it was difficult to imagine the Portuguese holding on the way he eventually did. Reinert as his lead pursuer never really had a chance to attack – quite the contrary. In fact, when Rodrigues missed the braking point at the entry to the Jacky Ickx chicane, he ploughed straight through the gravel trap back onto the track – still in the lead. Reinert was probably already struggling with some problem with his MAN, because at the exit of the final corner it slowly rolled off with a broken shock absorber. So it fell to Steffi Halm to attempt a grab act on the Portuguese MAN in front of her.
Hahn, meanwhile, had passed Lenz and was now in P3. Kiss and Albacete had, for their part, gotten the better of Lacko, who was dropping away in P7. We now had an identical situation to the earlier race, with Lenz and Kiss battling it out for P4 – only this time, their duel passed muster with the stewards.
At the front, Halm continued to gain on the leader and at the finish the two trucks were just four tenths apart, Rodrigues picking up his first win this season after an outstandingly collected drive. Hahn celebrated P3 with donuts and drifts, having succeeded in stretching his lead in the overall standings to 66 points and taken a leap, as it were, towards his fifth title. Lenz finished a wee bit ahead of Kiss, Albacete, and Lacko.
Faas picked up P8, followed by Janes and Anderson. The trio also took to the Grammer Truck Cup podium in the same order.
„Die Bullen von Iveco Magirus“ (Hahn / Halm) took top points among the teams, followed by Team Reboconort (Rodrigues / Rodrigues) and tankpool24 Racing (Kiss / Faas).
Hahn now has 280 points to Lacko’s 214. Albacete is third with 179, followed by Kiss (175), Lenz (160), Halm (152), Reinert (128), and Kursim (113).

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