Coelho takes A1 at ETS Slovakia
Bruno Coelho took a straight forward tone to tone win in the opening A-Main at the Yokomo Euro Touring Series in Slovakia. Starting from his first ETS pole position, the Xray driver led home team-mate Alexander Hagberg for what could be a significant result for the team at their home race with the threat of rain making it likely at least one of the two remaining Mains will not be run. Closest to the Xray duo, who were a class apart throughout the 5-minutes leaving the rest of the field behind, would be Tamiya’s Marc Rheinard. Starting fourth Rheinard inherited 3rd on the opening lap after a mistake from Meen Vejrak and then survived a challenge from Yannic Prumper to hold that position to the finish.
Posting the fastest lap of the race, himself & Hagberg the only drivers to manage 17-second lap times, Coelho said it was a ‘super good race’. Breaking away when Vejrak’s error delayed the pack on lap 1, the 22-year-old who is looking very strong to back up his maiden ETS victory in Luxembourg to match champion Volker as the only double race winner of the season, described the rest of the race as ‘controlled’. While Rheinard would close a little, the Portuguese driver said he was always comfortable with the gap over both Hagberg and the German. Looking to A2, which will end today’s action as heavy rain is expected in Trencin overnight, he said ‘I will just try to repeat what I did in the first one’.
Hagberg said it was ‘a nice clean race’. Describing his T4 as ‘very good’ he said while he closed the gap a little to Coelho he never got close enough to be in a position to make a pass. Asked if he thought he could mount a stronger challenge in A2 the Swede said he is very happy with how his car is performing and while he could push a little harder he ‘(doesn’t) want to risk (their) postions’. The third year the Arena has hosted the ETS finale, Xray have never won at the track which is next to their factory and a 1-2 in front of what is a record entry for the World famous championship would then be a dream result.
‘Not too bad’ was how Rheinard summed up the race. The German said he lost touch with the leaders on due to Vejrak. Encouraged by how he closed the gap towards the end, he added ‘it was too late’. Looking to secure second overall in the championship, a position he has claimed for the last four seasons behind Volker, he said his focus was on finishing third overall today as that would be enough to stay ahead of Hagberg in the points.
In the Xray Pro Stock class defending champion Marek Cerny threw away possibly the title. With a mistake from Nico Catelani on the opening lap allowing the Xray of Jan Ratheisky to the front, the German would open the door to allow team-mate Cerny to take the lead. With Helge Johannessen coming together with Ratheisky, this allowed Schumacher driver Tobias Seidl to hunt down Cerny. On the last lap the pressure got to the Czech driver as he put his T4 on its side with 30-seconds to go. A delighted Seidl took the win from Johannes Sperr as Cerny dropped to ninth putting the pressure on himself for A2 if he is to snatch the title from ARC’s Lars Hoppe who failed to make the A-Main after the fourth round of qualifying was cancelled due to weather concerns. In Formula, Jan Rathiesky took a last night victory from the Serpent of Top Qualifier David Ehrbar with Mike Gosvig completing the Top 3.
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