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Sunday in Navarra - Part 2

Sunday in Navarra - Part 2

02. June 2013Navarra - The weather was as we´d expected in the morning. At some places there was a strong breeze, but the sun broke through the clouds more often now, warming the air to a comfortable 18°. The 35,000 spectators will have been happiest, though, about the fact that it remained dry.
The first race was one of those occasional processions, like geese marching in single file, that you might expect on tracks that have longer straights and fewer curves and corners that don´t require heavy braking. Such an uneventful race, though, was rather surprising to see here on the challenging Circuito de Navarra.
The battle lines were drawn in the first lap, and the truck racers lapped the track in file for the rest of their 43-odd km. Sometimes the gap between two trucks was only a second, but you never had the impression that anyone wanted to hurt anyone else. It was a procession in the Formula 1 tradition, only without the pit stops.
And so Albacete won a relatively safe victory, 1.2 seconds ahead of Kiss. A second group of three trucks – Oestreich, Lacko, and Hahn – followed at some remove, the latter two having swapped places at the start. This trio drove bumper-to-bumper for many laps, giving rise to the hope that third spot might somehow become the object of a battle of sorts. But that hope was soon denied, and even these three crossed the finishing line one second apart.
Twenty seconds later came the quartet of Vršecký, Bösiger, Mäkinen, and Reinert, all again separated by a second. Bösiger, who´d struggled in the SuperPole with the differential on his truck, had made up two places, for sure, but even that rather unspectacularly. He was followed home by Mäkinen in eighth (which placed him on pole for the second race), and Reinert in ninth. Steffi Halm drove an equally pedestrian race to 10th place and her fourth FIA point.
Despite the lack of exciting action, a number of drivers were penalised for various infractions. Two pilots were disqualified because of smoke, others collected time penalties. But the only one that had any influence on the points, and on the starting grid for the last race of the weekend, was the 5-second penalty on Mika Mäkinen for improper overtaking. The Finn had gotten all his tyres on the grass while passing Reinert, and was ruled to have left the track.
There was far more excitement in store in the last race, mainly because of an accident at the approach to the main straight. Before that there had already been several changes of position — right at the start Mäkinen had to cede his pole to Reinert and take the German´s 9th place. When the lights turned green Bösiger shot into the lead, ahead of Reinert, Vršecký, Hahn, and the rest of the pack. The Swissman kept on extending his lead till he took his first win of this season, and so he had no idea of developments that were unfolding behind him. Reinert, under severe pressure from his pursuers, let Vršecký past in the fourth lap, only to find his rearward under ferocious assault from Oestreich. Soon enough there was a disastrous scrape between the two MANs. Oese spun around, hit the guardrail, and stalled at almost right angles to the track, blocking a good third of the width.
The race, surprisingly, was allowed to continue even though many others have have been stopped in far less precarious situations than this. Tempers ran high after Hungarian teen Benedek Major only barely avoided smashing into Oese´s stranded truck at top speed. Two other trucks had blocked his view of the track ahead, and the MAN pilot very possibly hadn´t seriously registered the yellow flags. The marshals then tried to push the 5½ tonne monster to a side, while the trucks thundered by at full tilt.
The crash set Reinert back four places to seventh, but he was eventually black-flagged and had to pull out. Hahn drove practically uncontested to third, followed closely by Kiss, Albacete, Lacko, and Mäkinen. Steffi Halm crossed the line in eighth after an interval of 25-odd seconds, followed by a rather docile Janiec and Major, who rounded out the top 10.
With this result, Halm has not only broken into the SuperPole twice; she´s earned seven points in all and now lies 12th in the FIA ranking. The graceful blonde drove another memorable race, having been forced onto the grass at the start by Mika Mäkinen, who was slower up to speed, causing her to drop back a couple of places. For three long laps she was in 12th , but managed it back into the top 10 after the fifth lap, and when Oestreich and Reinert dropped out a little later she moved up to eighth, finishing just where she did yesterday.
Hahn continues to lead the drivers´ ranking with 80 points, ahead of Vršecký (75), Albacete and Oestreich (both 64), Lacko (58), Mäkinen (50), Kiss (46), Bösiger (40), and Reinert (26). Truck Sport Lutz Bernau (Albacete / Oestreich) took top place in the team ranking in the first race ahead of MKR Technology (Lacko / Bösiger) and OXXO Energy Truck Race Team (Kiss / Major). MKR was on top in the second race ahead of Castrol Team Hahn Racing (Hahn / Mäkinen) and OXXO.

Supported by Meritor Translation: Eliot Lobo

Impressions:

Sunday in Navarra - Part 2
Sunday in Navarra - Part 2
Sunday in Navarra - Part 2
Sunday in Navarra - Part 2
Sunday in Navarra - Part 2