Sunday in Misano

25. May 2008Misano - The weather remained as it is expected of the Adriatic, no rain and temperatures of about 30 °C (86 °F), and at the time of the Qualy race the temperature on the track was even more than 43 °C (109 °F). A crowd of 27,000 had come to the Misano World Circuit. The first part of the timed practice took only two laps, when on Markus Altenstrasser’s Renault a front tyre came off and obstructed the track. And, same as the day before, the truck racers had to take an extra break in the pit lane. At that time Markus Bösiger and also a large number of other pilots had already clocked their fastest lap. Runner-up Antonio Albacete was only 2 tenths behind, and after the break he tried everything to steal the pole from the Buggyra pilot. In the end the Spaniard once more improved his lap times by 7 hundredths, but could not measure up to the 2:02.452 of the Swiss. Third on the grid was Bösiger’s team mate David Vrsecky ahead of to two MAN pilots Jochen Hahn and Jean-Phillip Belloc.
As already mentioned yesterday, in Misano the pole position in truck racing is a ‘two-edged sword’. And again, in the following Qualy race, the pilot starting from second position had an advantage. Albacete swiftly took the lead ahead of Bösiger, Hahn, and Vrsecky. But before the first lap was finished, the Swiss reclaimed his lead and held this position unchallenged to the end. Albacete, too, had put some distance between himself and his chasers Hahn and Vrsecky who fiercely contented for third place. For several laps the German fended off every attack of the Buggary pilot, who often seemed to be a bit faster. And 3 laps before the finish the blue Freightliner sped past Hahn’s black MAN. On fifth was Belloc, followed by Stuart Oliver (MAN). The rest of the points went to Frankie Vojtisek (Renault) ahead of Egon Allgäuer, Jean-Pierre Blaise, and Dominique Lacheze (all MAN pilots).
In the final Championship Race it was Bösiger who, for the first time this weekend, invalidated the thesis that in Misano the pole setter doesn’t stand a chance. The Swiss was so predominant – at times with an advantage of more than 10 seconds, before he slacked off a bit – that people could hardly understand why he only had finished third in both races the day before. Albacete had meanwhile to fight off Vrsecky’s attacks, but in the second half of the race the truck of the Czech slowed down a bit. In the battle for fourth position Hahn got the better of Belloc, but of course the French didn’t want to accept defeat and charged his colleague continuously. In the 8th lap, before entering the double bend Rio, Belloc ‘put all his eggs in one basket’ and overhauled Hahn’s black MAN, but left the braking too late and went wide. The Swabian passed the Frenchman on the inner track, who, in turn, closed up to the rear of Hahn’s truck again and started another furious attack, which the German couldn’t fend off. But Belloc was not satisfied yet and soon he was glued to the rear bumper of Vrsecky’s truck who had slowed a bit. And indeed, in the final lap shortly before the finishing line, he managed to pass the Czech Freightliner pilot, too. Behind Hahn, Oliver finished on 6th. Vojtisek, Altenstrasser, Javier Mariezcurrena, and Mikhael Konovalov (both MAN) got the remaining points.
In the overall standing Vrsecky has now 96 points, which means that Bösiger, with 90 points, Albacete (78), Belloc (65), and Hahn (53) could close the gap a bit. Same as yesterday, the team ranking was again plain sailing for Buggyra, ahead of Team Koller + Schwemmer, and Team Frankie.