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MAN-Test-Days in Nogaro

MAN-Test-Days in Nogaro

19. April 2012For the four days in mid-April in Nogaro in the south of France the drivers hoped for the best conditions. Unfortunately, the weather thwarted their plans. Monday and Tuesday have been acceptable, but the test results of the last two days were not really revealing. The highest temperature recorded on these days was 10 degrees C°; the sun was rarely shining and the days were filled with rain and strong winds, and it was difficult to draw a conclusion based on the test results. The track conditions changed almost every minute. However, the truck racers drove their laps. MAN organizes these test days before the beginning of the season and in the past also other teams have taken this opportunity. In fact, this time there were only MAN teams in Nogaro including the titleholder Jochen Hahn (GER) and his predecessor from Spain Antonio Albacete. None of the title aspirants revealed any details concerning the test drives. For MAN the most important thing is to defend their title in the individual ranking as well as in the team ranking. Still, they are competitors and want to defend their own title. That’s why it’s definitely understandable that the competitors had an eye on each other. After it became apparent that the race trucks from the Hahn team had advantages with the air resistant, the Bernau team (which includes Albacete) started to make some changes on the roof of the race truck, which Dominique Lacheze (FRA) was driving. Lutz Bernau though did not reveal if any of the changes had actually made a difference later on. Also with a Hahn-built RaceTrucks the Fin Mika Mäkinen who drives a MAN truck for the third season was in Nogaro as well as Truckracing-Rookie René Reinert (GER). Reinert attracted attention because he was extremely diligent. No matter what the race track looked like, the guy from the Lausitz (an area in the east of Germany) kept driving his rounds. Reinert will officially introduce his team to the public next week. As team boss Conny Hahn announced: Mäkinen as well as Reinert will complete the whole program of the FIA European Truck Racing Championship including both races in Instanbul and Smolensk.
The Lion Truck Racing team on the other hand (owned by the French entrepreneur Patrick Folleas) will only attend some particularly chosen races of the European Championship. The CEO of the Lyon-based company BFT Transports bought the entire truck racing equipment from Egon Allgäuer. With this Folleas started a kind of mission to bring truck racing a little bit closer to the fans of other motorsports. On Easter Jean-Phillip Belloc drove a Lion-MAN during the FIA-GT-Championship in Nogaro in a drag race. The French, who had already won points for the Bernau team in the FIA-ETRC was also a test driver of the Lion team. His compatriot Ludovic Faure, former Champion of SuperRaceTrucks, did his test laps on a rainy Thursday. Steffi Halm was the secret star of the Lion team. The young German woman had her first glimpse into the truck racing world, when she drove the tankpool24-Mercedes-Benz from MB-Motorsport last season. This year she wanted to concentrate more on the mini challenge, where she could achieve successes in the past. And then she received an offer from Lion, which she can perfectly combine with her ambitions to attend the mini challenges. That means that she will attend all races of the French Truck Racing Championship and some of the European Championship, if these dates don’t overlap with the races of the mini challenge. When it came to being diligent she was just as good as Reinert. According to the team boss Achim Stroth Halm completed the program of several race weekends on both test days. Among the MAN- A-Teams the Frankie Oxxo Truck Racing Team was missing in Nogaro. They announced to have a delay in the construction of the race trucks in Prague. That is why it is not certain yet if the team will even be in Istanbul at the beginning of the season. They even had some MAN trucks in Nogaro which don’t have the so-called A engines (those with the highest development stage) but have been in regular use in European truck racing. The experienced driver Noel Crozier and his son Hervé will again be alone at the starting line of the French championship. Javier Mariezcurrena from Spain, who won his first European Championship in Nogaro last year, as well as Jeremy Robineu from France, used the test days to prepare intensively for the upcoming season.

Impressions:

MAN-Test-Days in Nogaro
MAN-Test-Days in Nogaro