Xray leads the way in practice
Team Xray have laid down the early pace at the fourth round of the Yokomo Euro Touring Series in Austria as their drivers filled the top two spots on the time sheets after free practice. Racing at the temporary fahr(T)raum track in Mattsee, it was Bruno Coelho who set the fastest time ahead of team-mate Alexander Hagberg while last year’s winner Ronald Volker completed the Top 3. With low traction the order of the day, Round 3 winner Yannic Prumper would end the four rounds of practice only 6th fastest but for the other of this season’s race winners things faired even worse with Marc Rheinard only managing 20th.
‘Super good’ was Coelho’s response to how free practice had gone. The Portuguese star, who burst in the title contention in Italy when he finished on the podium, said the big focus has been on getting steering for the low traction. Describing his T4 as ‘now stable’, he said the steering is not perfect but its good and he is happy going into the two rounds of seeding practice. Commenting on the track, this being his first visit to the boards style track, he said the traction was similar to what he would be used to in Portugal, saying it feels ‘like a home race’.
Hagberg was happy with his early pace on a track he said is ‘definitely not (his) favourite’. The Swede is not a fan of the small size and low traction and while he of course wants to find more steering said for the conditions presented to him his T4 is working very good. In that quest to get more steering he will make some small changes for the first timed practice.
Volker wasn’t giving away too much information, the reigning champion said things were ‘good so far’ and he would ‘see how controlled practice goes’. The German said while the layout was the same as last year it is quite different to drive this time round due to the new curbing and low traction. The Yokomo driver said the traction has reached a certain point and does look to be getting better adding its never going to get even close to how it was in 2014.
HB driver Andy Moore would set the fourth fastest time with the British ace quietly upbeat about his practice runs. Having struggled in Italy he said he had a bit of a rethink when he got home and having done some testing in the UK he feels he came here with a good base set-up. Saying it is ‘unusual’ for him he hasn’t changed much on his PRO 5. Commenting on the track he said while the traction is ‘weird’ he said the new curbing and lower white track boards makes the track more forgiving. Team-mate Jilles Groskamp is struggling so far with the Dutch ace at a loss as to why. Having ran Moore’s set-up, the 2012 World Champion said he didn’t like it describing his car as if it was driving on ice. Feeling he is ‘3/10th of the pace’ he said the traction means even small improvements to the feel of the car can make for a big improvement in pace.
Showing the track is strong for Xray, Marco Kaufmann posted the 5th fastest time ahead Prumper. Breaking his Yokomo in the final free practice after a change to 2-degree tow-in made he car hard to drive, the German said he is still trying to find a suitable set-up for the conditions but he didn’t seem overly concerned by his current pace.
With Akio Sobue the fastest Tamiya in 7th just behind the Serpent of Viktor Wilck, lead driver Rheinard was at a lose as to why he had lost pace today. While his TRF419 ‘felt OK’ in the two timed free practice rounds yesterday he said this morning its ‘not good’. Asked what the problem was he said for the first seeding practice he would be putting ‘a lot of attention on the tyres’.
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