Rheinard wins Dutch ETS
Marc Rheinard has claimed his first ETS victory for 12-months, the German taking his third consecutive Apeldoorn win which is where the 3-time former World Champion last stood on the top step of the podium. Dominating the second leg of the A-Main ahead of team-mate Viktor Wilck, who didn’t mount the much anticipated challenge, the win maintains Tamiya’s 100% winning record at the Dutch track, which has now hosted the race 4-times. Behind the Tamiya 1-2, Team Yokomo’s Ronald Volker completed the Top 3 with the defending champion and Wilck now set to battle it out for what could be a crucial second place in terms of the championship standings with two rounds still remaining.
With Rheinard handed an easy win in Leg 1 after Wilck spun out off the start line, a clean start second time of asking by the Swede set the stage for a good battle between the duo. Evenly matched on pace in qualifying and having a distinct performance this weekend over their rivals, Wilck would unfortunately be no match for the Top Qualifier who setting a new fastest lap of the event on just his second lap pulled clear to win a very uneventful race by 1.8 seconds from Wilck who in turn finished 2.1-seconds in front of Volker. In fact the Top 5 drivers started as they finished, Yokomo’s Eric Dankel the best placed mover in the race finishing 6th having started in 8th.
Commenting on the race, Wilck said he just didn’t have the pace to match his team-mate. Lacking the same level of steering and corner speed he said Rheinard had the better set-up, the German who will sit out leg 3 running a different top deck and front arm set-up on his TRF417. Not willing to risk switching his car over to the same set-up as Rheinard for the third leg he said with his car as it is now he should be able to hold off Volker for the A3 win and second overall, the Tamiya team not having had a 1-2 since this time last year when they filled all three podium places.
Volker said changes to his LRP powered BD7 made his understeer issues even worse and his concern was not battling with Wilck but keeping HB’s Andy Moore at bay. In the end he managed that but he said a lap or two more and the Brit would probably have taken third from him. With a podium position pretty secure following his 2nd & 3rd place finishes in the opening two legs, the only driver to finish every race this season on the podium said its time to ‘Go big or go home’ for the final A-Main and he will switch cars. Keen to secure second which would hurt Wilck’s championship aspirations, he will run his practice chassis in the hope he find the steering he is looking for.
In the Xray Pro Stock the overall winner of Round 4 of the Yokomo Euro Touring Series was also decided with defending champion Zdenko Kunak taking a tone to tone win to claim his first ETS win since taking over the reign of the series biggest class, 133 drivers competing in the class that features a controlled Speed Passion speedo and handout motor. After the second leg race director Scotty Ernst had all the cars thoroughly inspected with ratios checked, motor stripped and even the speedo disassembled to check for any tampering with the circuit boards. We are glad to report that all cars passed the scrutiny muting rumors that cheating was going on in this hugely successful class. Behind Kunak, who was clearly delighted to take his first win of the 2012/13 season and first major win with Yokomo, Martin Hofer again finished second despite a strong challenge from last year’s race winner Vasco Christiaanse.
Ride Modified A-Main Leg 2 Result
1.(1) Marc Rheinard (DE) – Tamiya – 20/5:06.456
2.(2) Viktor Wilck (SE) – Tamiya – 20/5:08.204
3.(3) Ronald Volker (DE) – Yokomo – 20/5:10.378
4.(4) Andy Moore (GB) – HB – 20/5:10.730
5.(5) Yannic Prumper (DE) – Yokomo – 20/5:11.619
6.(8) Eric Dankel (DE) – Yokomo – 20/5:12.670
7.(6) Christopher Krapp (DE) – Kyosho – 19/5:00.089
8.(10)Loic Jasmin (FR) – Yokomo – 19/5:03.536
9.(7) Marc Fischer (DE) – Serpent – 19/5:06.680
10.(9)Thomas Pumpler (DE) – Tamiya – 0/0:00.000
Xray Pro Stock A-Main Leg 2 Result
1.(1) Zdenko Kunak (SK) – Yokomo – 18/5:17.826
2.(2) Martin Hofer (DE) – Schumacher – 17/5:02.314
3.(3) Vasco Christiaanse (NL) – Kyosho – 17/5:02.946
4.(4) Dominic Vogl (AT) – Awesomatix – 17/5:02.958
5.(5) Alexander Stocker (DE) – Xray – 17/5:05.128
6.(7) Valetin Hettrich (DE) – Xray – 17/5:06.906
7.(10)Tobias Vogel (DE) – Xray – 17/5:07.459
8.(8) John Bruins (NZ) – Kyosho – 17/5:09.297
9.(9) Oliver Bultynck (BE) – VBC – 8/2:29.229
10.(6)Philip Tschupp (CH) – Top Racing – 7/2:11.756
View the full event results here.
View the complete event image gallery here.
