THIRD WIN FOR HAHN AS RODRIGUES RETURNS TO OVERALL PODIUM
Jochen Hahn has made a 25-point dent in Norbert Kiss’ championship lead taking victory in Race One whilst the Hungarian failed to finish. José Eduardo Rodrigues made a return visit to the overall podium, claiming his eighth Promoter’s Cup victory behind Sascha Lenz.
Both Germans in the overall championship fight, Hahn and Lenz, made good inroads on their competitors, with Kiss and Antonio Albacete having worse results in Race One. Kiss had led from the front, continuing what has become somewhat typical of the odd-numbered races, when three laps in, his turbo charger failed. The reigning champion tried to keep going at a reduced race pace, but the component failed coming down the main straight, forcing him to retire.
Avoiding a full course yellow or safety car situation, Kiss stopped at an opening on the pit wall so that he could reverse his truck off the track and get it back to the paddock. The team now have a huge effort to repair the truck so Kiss can take to the grid for Race Two, starting at 16:40 local time.
“Very disappointing,” Kiss said upon being asked about the retirement. “Again, safely in the lead, building the gap and then it looks like the turbo charger went. Obviously disappointed losing the win like this but it happens in truck racing.”
After Kiss’ retirement, Hahn inherited the lead, driving a clean race to take the first win of the weekend. Lenz, who had been in a tight battle with Rodrigues for third, put the pressure on his fellow countryman to try and take his first win of the season, but the veteran remained calm and collected, taking the chequered flag.
It was a great race from Rodrigues, who started his day impressively with fourth place overall on the starting grid. Going into Turn 1, the Portuguese driver looked to make the move on Lenz, but Lenz just about had the pace on him to keep the Chrome driver behind. The battle continued for a few laps until Lenz shot off down the road to chase Hahn. The solid performance never saw any threat of Rodrigues losing fourth place, Steffi Halm finishing fifth two seconds further down the road. The fourth place overall also gave Rodrigues the Promoter’s Cup victory.
André Kursim and Steffen Faas battled all the way through Race One, having started next to each other on row five. Kursim defended well to keep the Promoter’s Cup driver behind, securing himself third on the reverse grid for Race Two.
Faas finished seventh, second in Promoter’s Cup, and will line up next to the final Promoter’s Cup podium finisher Clemens Hecker on the reverse grid front row.
John Newell, Luis Recuenco and Jonathan André were the final classified drivers of Race One, with Mark Taylor and Jamie Anderson joining Kiss on the DNF list. Taylor was disqualified from the race after three over speeding infringements, whilst Anderson had an air pressure failure that the team tried to fix in the pit lane to get him back on track.
Newell and André both had ten second penalties for over speeding infringements, but given Newell’s lead over Recuenco and the fact André was at the back of the field, the final result did not change once those penalties were added.
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