Rheinard takes victory at ETS Finale
Marc Rheinard has taken victory at the season finale of the Yokomo Euro Touring Series at the Hudy Racing Arena, giving the championship’s most winning manufacturer Tamiya their first & only win of the 2013/14 championship. Having not won in the world famous championship for over a season, the most winning driver claimed his 12th victory as he backed up his A1 win with a dominant performance in A2, helped hugely by his TRF team-mate Viktor Wilck. Despite having the slowest car on the track, the number 2 starting Wilck managed to keep a train of cars behind him for the entire five minutes allowing Rheinard to pull clear for an easy 3.6 second winning margin. The battle for second was an impeccable display of world class driving as despite their close proximity and high speeds of the cars there was no contact. With the top 4 finishing in the order which they started with Ronald Volker 3rd and Alexander Hagberg 4th, World Champion Jilles Groskamp was the highest place finisher to make a pass again getting by the Yokomo of Yannic Prumper for 5th.
After one of his toughest ETS seasons, Rheinard was ‘maximum happy’ to maintain his record of being the only driver to win a race every season for the last 6 years of the championship. The 3-time World Champion was quick to pay tribute to Tamiya who he said have really worked hard recently on making their car competitive in particular against the Yokomo of ETS Champion Ronald Volker. He said ‘In Luxembourg we were close and today we were best which shows we are headed in good direction now with the car’. A World Championship year, Tamiya 3 time back to back defending champions, he said ‘now that we know we have a competitive car we can focus on testing to improve it more’. Commenting on A2, he said having not been so happy with his Much More powered prototype TRF418 in the opening Main the car was now perfect again the only change made being a new set of tyres. Repeating his fast get away from the line he said he could immediately see Wilck was ‘slower’ and he was easily able to extend the gap adding he could have without much effort pushed a lot harder he had needed to.
Wilck said with the train of cars behind him, the group containing at one point 6-cars running noise to tail, he thought it was all going to end up with someone crashing into him as he was so slow. Lacking steering so much so that he had to lift for the straight left hand kick he complimented Volker on his driving saying ‘Ronald really took care’. No idea as to why the car was so slow he said he hoped it was maybe due to the set of tyres he had. While he will fit a fresh set of tyres for A3 as he hopes to win the leg and make it a Tamiya 1-2 on the podium he said they will also make some small set-up changes.
‘5-minutes of driving behind a tank’, that was the wording Volker used to sum up the race. Really happy with changes made to the set-up of his LRP powered BD7 between legs, he said he couldn’t show its potential as he just couldn’t find a way passed Wilck who had ‘no pace’. The 4-time back to back champion said the problem was compounded further by how close the cars behind him where meaning he couldn’t even attempt to take a risk in trying to get by the Tamiya. Saying a mistake was his only opportunity, he said Wilck blocked well and didn’t put a wheel wrong despite the pressure adding it was great to see 5 cars running so close at such high speeds and keep it clean. Looking to A3 when he has the potential to take second overall with a win, he said he hoped he would get the chance to show the potential of his car.
Asked about his race Hagberg said ‘Viktor (Wilck) was very slow for some reason and nobody could get by one another and it was simple as that’. Enjoying running so closely with his rivals he said it was a great showcase for racing at the highest level and he had a lot of respect for all the drivers involved.
Groskamp said he almost threw away the race off the line as his Tamiya attempted to do a doughnut. Changing from doing one and a half warm-up laps for A2 he just did half a lap while making his way to the line which he said obviously wasn’t enough for his tyres. The start allowed team-mate Akio Sobue passed but the Dutch ace said his car was really good and he was able to catch back up. He said staring 6th from the grid he always knew it was going to be difficult to get a good result as was seen by the train battling for second spot but he was ‘super happy for Tamiya that they are back winning in the ETS’, a championship Groskamp has won twice for the Japanese company.
In the Xray Pro-Stock class Marek Cerny also made it two from two but for the Czech driver the result not only gave him a home win for his Xray team but also allowed him to successfully defend his title. Re-igniting his title hopes with a win at the previous ETS encounter in Luxembourg, Cerny needed to TQ and win the season finale and not putting a wheel wrong all weekend he did just that. Repeating his domination of A1, Cerny would again win A2 comfortably over fellow Xray drivers David Nemcek and Kuba Simurda.
Ride Modified A-Main Leg 2 Result
1.(1) Marc Rheinard (DE) – Tamiya Racing Factory – 17/5:05.460
2.(2) Viktor Wilck (SE) – Tamiya Racing Factory – 17/5:09.055
3.(3) Ronald Volker (DE) – Team Yokomo – 17/5:09.247
4.(4) Alexander Hagberg (SE) – Xray Racing Team – 17/5:09.455
5.(6) Jilles Groskamp (NL) – Tamiya Racing Factory – 17/5:09.841
6.(5) Yannic Prumper (DE) – Team Yokomo – 17/5:10.804
7.(8) Loic Jasmin (FR) – Team Yokomo – 17/5:11.043
8.(9) Viljami Kutvonen (FI) – Awesomatix – 17/5:19.338
9.(10)Alessio Menicucci (IT) – Xray Racing Team – 16/5:02.735
10.(7)Akio Sobue (JP) – Tamiya Racing Factory – 16/5:02.981
Xray Pro-Stock A-Main Leg 2 Result
1.(1) Marek Cerny (CZ) – Xray – 15/5:00.302
2.(3) David Nemcek (SK) – Xray – 15/5:02.500
3.(2) Kuba Simurda (CZ) – Xray – 15/5:03.126
4.(4) Jan Ratheisky (DE) – Xray – 15/5:03.765
5.(5) Henrik Heitsch (DE) – ARC – 15/5:09.114
6.(10)Mike Gosvig (DK) – Awesomatix – 15/5:16.078
7.(6) Tobias Seidl (DE) – Team C – 15/5:16.159
8.(7) Kevin Homburg (DE) – ARC – 15/5:17.242
9.(9) Mustafa Alp (TR) – VBC Racing – 15/5:19.373
10.(8)Philip Tschupp (CH) – Serpent – 15/5:20.984
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