Yokomo 1-2 in second qualifier at fahr(T)raum
Ronald Volker backed up his opening qualifying performance by leading a Team Yokomo 1-2 in the second round of qualifying this morning at Round 4 of the Yokomo Euro Touring Series at the fahr(T)raum Museum in Mattsee, Austria. The only driver to run 24-laps of the track in last night’s Q1, Volker improved on that time by 2.3 seconds with team-mate Yannic Prumper and Tamiya’s Viktor Wilck joining him on 24-laps to complete the Top 3 for the round.
Pleased to pick up where he finished Day 1 of the event, Volker said the run was going perfect for the first 3-minutes but then the radio of Marc Rheinard start to impede his view a little resulting in a break of concentration as he tried to reposition himself on the podium. Making a ‘big mistake in the fast section’ resulting in his car hitting the boards twice, he said the impact tweaked his carbon chassis’d BD7. Leader of the championship standings, he said luckily he built up enough of a gap in those first three minutes, when he posted the fastest lap, to allow him to still manage to top the round.
Prumper summed up his run as ‘better than yesterday’ and was happy to have been able to snatch second from former team-mate Wilck on the last lap. Changing from an aluminium to a carbon chassis for Q2, he said his car was a little easier to drive but with understeer still being a slight issue early in the run he will make a number of changes for Q3. Mechanic Toni Rheinard said with ‘two OK runs’ they can try a few things. Running a harder rear shock oil, for the penultimate qualifier they will change to the same oil both front & rear along with going to a lighter rear diff to try and get better rotation.
Admitting to throwing away a Top 2 finish due to a crash on his penultimate lap which then lead to a ‘bad last lap’, Wilck said his TRF418 was better than yesterday and he can only put that down to a change of tyres. Following his crash the Swede is grinding down his axle stubs in order to make sure they don’t get caught in the track boards. For Q3 he will also fit a fresh set of C-Hubs to the car.
While Wilck felt his Q2 tyres were better, for his German team-mate Marc Rheinard a change of tyres had the opposite effect. A very competitive second fastest in Q1, Rheinard clearly struggled from the start in Q2 having to let a faster Wilck by early on. Ending the qualifier only 7th fastest the 3-time World Champion will revert to his Q1 set of tyres which he hopes will allow him to get a second competitive run in.
Serpent’s Marc Fischer posted the 4th fastest time. The German said his S411 ERYX 3.0 ‘felt better’ than yesterday but catching Hagberg he ended up hitting a pipe which cost him a few 1/10ths. He said he was putting blame on the Swede as he was running his own qualifier but catching the Xray driver a second time he moved over to let him passed. Feeling the conditions are changing, being a warm sunny day in Mattsee today, he will change to a harder rear diff in the hope it will give him more on-power steering.
Posting the 5th fastest time, Hagberg said he didn’t make any mistakes but ultimately he was too slow. Lacking corner speed, the Round 2 race winner said they need to work on the set-up of his T4.
Having only arrived Thursday night and missed out on the day of free practice his rivals got, factory Kyosho driver Christopher Krapp said things are getting better today. Struggling in timed practice yesterday, the former ETS race winner being seeded in the second fastest heat, he described Q2 as a ‘decent run’. Working to cure his TF6 of understeer he said every run things get better, a combination of both the cars set-up improving and his own driving improving – the latter being the bigger factor. While he said right now he doesn’t have Top 5 pace he said his main aim for the remaining two qualifiers is to do enough to make the A-Main.
Behind Rheinard in 7th, HB’s Andy Moore posted the 8th fastest time ahead of the Awesomatix of Freddy Sudhoff. The Top 10 was completed by Team Xray’s Magnus Vassmar who was half a second faster than his car’s designer Martin Hudy who was 11th.
In the Xray Pro Stock class defending Champion Marek Cerny TQ’d the second qualifier. The factory Xray driver was on target for the first 22-laps run but on his last lap his T4 would shutdown leaving him with 21-laps in 4:59.229. Running a time of 21/5:00.172, former Champion Martin Hofer took his factory Schumacher ride to the second fastest time with Q1 pace setter Jan Ratheisky completing the Top 3. In Formula Ratheisky took the second TQ run of the weekend ahead of the Speed Passion of Austrian Thomas Pumpler with Xray’s Francesco Martini completing the Top 3.
Ride Modified Round 2 Qualifying – Top 10
1. Ronald Volker – Team Yokomo – 24/5:09.817
2. Yannic Prumper – Team Yokomo – 24/5:11.639
3. Viktor Wilck – Tamiya Racing Factory – 24/5:11.924
4. Marc Fischer – Team Serpent – 23/5:01.080
5. Alexander Hagberg – Team Xray – 23/5:02.278
6. Christopher Krapp – Kyosho – 23/5:03.323
7. Marc Rheinard – Tamiya Racing Factory – 23/5:03.478
8. Andy Moore – HB – 23/5:04.224
9. Freddy Sudhoff – Awesomatix – 23/5:04.426
10.Magnus Vassmar – Team Xray – 23/5:05.746
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