WIN 14 FOR KISS AS ADVANTAGE GOES TO HECKER IN CHROME
It was another text book performance from Norbert Kiss to secure his 14th win of the season, but all eyes were on Clemens Hecker as his sixth Chrome win of the season moved him to a point behind Bradley Smith in the Chrome standings.
Sascha Lenz had looked to try and make a move on Kiss off the line, but found himself on the defensive as Jochen Hahn tried to demote him to third. It was wheel-to-wheel action between the two of them, with Lenz holding his lines well enough to keep the upper hand. Hahn did try again the next lap, but a mistake through Villeneuve Chicane gave the advantage to the second place-starting man.
The top three finished as they started, with Hahn not able to create another opportunity to try and pass Lenz.
In his 900th race, Antonio Albacete had a bit of a quiet one, but raced beautifully to secure a P4 finish. Steffi Halm managed to get past Hecker in the opening laps to put herself back in contention for the Titan fight, and although she reeled Albacete in, she didn’t quite have enough to get any higher than P5.
A 10s penalty for René Reinert put a stop to any progress he’d made in his recovery race, with Hecker taking sixth overall as he sped to another Chrome victory.
Mark Taylor also made fast progress up the field in the opening laps, passing Luis Recuenco and Luke Garrett to take second in class. But he couldn’t quite find enough to pass Hecker for the win on the tight and twisty Circuit Zolder.
The duo was joined on the podium by Garrett, who had been running a happy fourth until a last lap mistake from Recuenco promoted him to get some silverware. After his difficult Most, a P2 in qualifying and P3 in the race is a fantastic start to his weekend. Reinert’s 10s penalty promoted Garrett up to P9 overall as the German slotted into 10th behind him.
José Eduardo Rodrigues could only make it to P8 by the chequered flag, one of his lowest scoring races for a while. The silver lining is the position gives him reverse grid pole and he will share the front row with Taylor for Race 2. Taylor will be focused on keeping Hecker behind him to try and make up some of the lost points to the German he conceded in Race 1.
It was certainly not the race Bradley Smith wanted, finishing behind two of his Chrome title rivals, with Hecker now only one point behind him in the standings, Taylor trailing by just five. He’ll be hoping to rectify this in Race 2, but with Hecker and Taylor at the front of the grid thanks to the reverse grid, it’ll be a tall ask to get past them from his position of 12th. It's more than likely we’ll have a new Chrome leader by the end of the day.
Jonathan André finished sixth in class on his Goodyear FIA ETRC return, just behind John Newell who spent most of the race stuck behind Steffen Faas. It was good news all round for the Freightliner, which managed to complete the full 12 laps after the failure that saw him unable to qualify earlier. Overspeeding for both Faas and Stefan Kursch saw them taking a drive through penalty, which dropped them both to the very back of the grid.
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