AMAZING ALBACETE TAKES COMEBACK WIN IN RACE 4
After a dramatic start to Race 3 that nearly saw the Spaniard unable to restart the race, Antonio Albacete brought his highly damaged truck to overall victory to end the weekend on a high.
It was a much more subdued start to the last race of the weekend, with Mark Taylor leading the 14-stong grid across the line. The Brit had looked to hold off Albacete, who started alongside him, and retained the lead going through Turn 1. It was, once again, Turn 3 where disaster struck, as coming out of the third corner Taylor went wide. He managed to keep his truck going, cutting across the grass run off area, but not losing any speed for the corner, he re-entered the track with some pace. It was a very close call and a worse incident could have occurred, but Taylor managed to get the truck back under control to only brush up alongside at the time third-placed Sascha Lenz.
Body work came off the SL Apollo Tyres Trucksport machine, but both contenders were able to continue. The loss of momentum, however, cost Taylor who dropped down the field, getting back into the fight for overall P6.
Albacete, now with an advantage over the field avoiding Taylor re-joining, began to stretch out a lead that would become six seconds by the end of the race. The Spaniard commented in post-race interviews that it had been a bad weekend with bad luck throughout, and he was glad to give the team a victory to thank them for all their hard work.
Behind the leader, Lenz had been trying to make inroads on his growing gap, but soon found himself preoccupied with Norbert Kiss, pushing him to try to demote him from second overall. Kiss had a good start, getting up to sixth before the Taylor incident promoted him to fifth. He made quick work of a still struggling Jochen Hahn and Steffi Halm to get onto Lenz’ rear in an attempt to take another podium from the weekend. He had to settle for third behind Lenz, his first non-victory podium of the season.
Lukas Hahn managed to hold Halm off to the chequered flag, beating her by just three-tenths of a second and taking his third Promoter’s Cup victory in a row, four Promoter’s Cup podiums of the weekend. He was three seconds off taking his second overall podium of the weekend. The young German has proved himself a worthy competitor this weekend and will be hoping to continue this form next time out at his home race at the Nürburgring.
After the earlier incident, Taylor hung onto sixth overall to take his fourth Promoter’s Cup podium of the weekend. It’s been a great weekend for Taylor, who has found his groove on track. Whether this is track specific or that he has got the rhythm of the Goodyear FIA European Truck Racing Championship will be revealed when we next go racing in Germany.
Jamie Anderson and André Kursim took seventh and eighth respectively ahead of Jochen Hahn. This weekend has been a difficult one for the veteran German, who has really struggled with pace around the TOR Poznań circuit. It has definitely left him and his team with some homework ahead of their home race at the Nürburgring in a couple of weeks’ time, especially when his son performed incredibly well.
José Eduardo Rodrigues took the final overall point, finishing tenth overall and capping off his weekend with a third-place finish in Promoter’s Cup. His championship lead now stands around 30 points ahead of his closest rival, Steffen Faas, who, like Jochen Hahn, had a bit of a weekend to forget in Poland. Insult was added to injury for Faas when he was handed a drive through penalty for over speeding on the formation lap, dropping him out of contention to fight for the Promoter’s Cup podium.
He finished behind John Newell in 12th, ahead of Johnathan André.
Luis Recuenco was unable to finish the final race of the weekend, pitting on lap 3 due to a technical issue.
The end of the weekend also saw the Goodyear FIA ETRC’s first Young Driver’s Trophy awarded. This new trophy, given to the young driver (drivers under 30 years of age are eligible in this category) who scores the most points over a race weekend, has been installed into the championship this season to encourage more young truck drivers to get involved in the series. With four Promoter’s Cup podiums, three of which were wins, and one overall win, it was unsurprising to see Lukas Hahn crowned this weekend ahead of Rodrigues.
Racing resumes in two weeks’ time when the grid makes its way to Germany for the Int. ADAC Truck Grand Prix. It’s one of the highlights of the Goodyear FIA ETRC calendar and certainly not one to be missed!
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