Saturday at the Nürburgring Part 2 - First win of the season for Lacko
20. July 2019Nürburgring - The sun was still out at the grid formation, which was followed by the drivers’ presentation. An hour later, when Race 2 finally got underway after a 10 minute delay, the sky took on a menacing hue. A couple of laps before the finish it grew dark over the far corners of the circuit and a few drops fell, but there was no more rain.
Polesitter Janiec was the first to turn into the right-hander at the end of the start straight, but he wasn’t the first out. There were impacts between a number of trucks in the dip, with the result that the running order was shuffled beyond recognition. José Rodrigues now led the field, though Janiec was still up there – but only just. First to cross the line at the completion of the lap was Lacko, followed by Rodrigues and Körber. Janiec, now in P4, had a run-in with Kiss that caused mortal damage to the front underside of his MAN and precipitated an instant retirement. One lap later the Hungarian’s Mercedes met with the same fate.
A few twists down the road, the field looked completely different once again. The three Ivecos of Halm, Reinert, and Kursim, who had started from the rear-end of the grid following their DNFs in the earlier race, were now running up in midfield. Lenz, who seemed to have fallen back in the early laps, had returned to the hunt at the front, and he attacked Körber relentlessly over more than seven laps, finally succeeding in breaking Mr Truckracing’s resistance to move into P3. Hahn and Albacete followed not long after.
Lacko was by now within sniffing distance of victory and too far ahead to be threatened, but Rodrigues appeared easy meat for the hungry trio, who set off in hot pursuit. He was hauled in by Lenz on the antepenultimate lap, by Hahn on the last lap but one, and by Albacete a couple of corners before the flag. Lenz and Hahn were loudly cheered by the fans as they crossed the line in Lacko’s wake, followed by Albacete and Rodrigues.
Halm, who’d stormed up to P6, led Körber, Reinert, Kursim, and Anderson at the flag. The Brit took victory in the Grammer Truck Cup race-within-the-race, ahead of compatriot Terry Gibbon and Spaniard Luis Recuenco.
Löwen Power (Albacete / Lenz) locked out the top step of the podium for the teams, with Buggyra Racing (Lacko / Janes) and „Die Bullen von Iveco Magirus“ coming in second and third.
More than two hours after the finish, the stewards announced changes to the official result. Albacete and Gibbon were each given five second penalties. That meant different podium compositions for the Grammer Truck Cup and the team championship.
Steffi Halm (109) stays second in the overall standings followed by Albacete (108), Kiss (107), Lacko (106), Lenz (92) Reinert (83), and Kursim (48).
Impressions:
