Adam Lacko took a superb victory in race one of the penultimate race of the 2016 FIA European Truck Racing season at Jarama in Spain this afternoon. It was the Buggyra International Racing system driver’s 13th win of the 2016 season.
Adam Lacko took a superb victory in race one of the penultimate race of the 2016 FIA European Truck Racing season at Jarama in Spain this afternoon. It was the Buggyra International Racing system driver’s 13th win of the 2016 season.
The Czech headed home title rival Jochen Hahn by just 0.672s in a close race which saw the two almost tied together for the duration of the contest. In a microcosm of the season so far there was little to choose between the two on the challenging track near Madrid but after leading in to the first corner Lacko led to the chequered flag despite intense pressure from Hahn.
The result ensures that Lacko has reduced the gap in the championship fight to 30 points with seven races remaining.
Rene Reinert took another podium to consolidate his third position in the championship. The German was unable to match the pace of the top two but came home a comfortable third ahead of Norbert Kiss in his Tankpool24 Racing Mercedes-Benz.
Just behind Kiss the fight for fifth position raged all race with Anthony Janiec (Lion Truck Racing), Steffi Halm (Reinert Racing) and Sascha Lenz jousting throughout the whole race. Initially Halm was up to fourth position but slipped back on the opening lap behind Janiec. She then spent the rest of the race on the Frenchman’s tail but was unable to get by. But in the final corners Lenz was able to make a move on Halm after contact between Janiec and Kiss made her lose momentum. Lenz took advantage and duly grabbed sixth position with just a few corners remaining and the three all finished within 0.946s of each other.
Ellen Lohr (Lutz Truck Sport) took eighth position after holding off the advances of Jiri Forman’s Buggyra International Racing System ‘FatFox’. Lohr, one of the most successful female racers to ever race, will start from pole position for race two on the reversed grid. With Steffi Halm starting alongside her it will be the first time in FIA ETRC history there has been an all-female front-row.
The final point went the way of Erwin Kleinnagelvoort. The Dutchman took his white Scania to another strong result to claim the final point.
In the teams championship it was Team Reinert Adventure who headed Buggyra 1969 to extend their championship lead. In third place was the Lion/Lenz alliance of Anthony Janiec and Sascha Lenz.
The Rodrigues family enjoyed a competitive race with the trio finishing 11th (Eduardo Rodriguez), 12th (Jose Fernando Rodriguez) and 14th (Jose Eduardo Rodriguez)
The leading Spanish entry in the finishing order was Pedro Marco in 15th while three of the five race by race entrants (Enrique Villa, Alberto Villa and Orlando Rodriguez) were disqualified for ignoring a penalty flag.
The second race of the Jarama weekend is scheduled to take place at 17.10 local time.
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** Note: Norbert Kiss was penalised after race one for forcing Rene Reinert off the track. He received a drive through penalty converted to 30-seconds. Thus he finished the raced in ninth place ensuring that aniec, Lenz, Halm, Lohr and Forman moved up a position to 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th respectively**