Coelho again in Q2
The second round of qualifying at the Yokomo Euro Touring Series in Germany was a repeat of Q1 as Xray again topped the time sheets with Bruno Coelho fastest ahead of team-mate Alexander Hagberg. Behind the Xrays it was Yokomo who provided the greatest challenge with Yannic Prumper completing the Top 3 ahead of reigning Champion Ronald Volker. For championship leader and 2015 event winner Marc Rheinard, the round would again only net a P6 with the German needing to turn things around for the final two qualifiers.
Getting his T4 up on two wheels at the beginning of the heat when he hit the curbing, Coelho said he was ‘a little lucky not to flip’ but other than that it was a ‘good run’. Posting the fastest lap on his way to the only 23-lap run, the Portuguese said small changes made to his set-up after Q1 left it ‘almost the same’. While the car was again ‘really good’, as highlighted by his one & a half second advantage over Hagberg, for Q3 he said ‘we will try a few more things for the next one’.
Not happy with his driving in Q1, Hagberg described the second qualifier as ‘very good’. Although he would make a mistake on lap 5, saying ‘I guess I was trying too hard’, he was particularly happy that he was able to recover the 1-second lost. With his lap times dropping off towards the end of the 5-minutes, the 2014 event winner will make some changes to his T4 set-up to try and find more pace at the end.
Describing his BD7 as ‘super good at the beginning’, Prumper said ‘I could keep up with the Xrays but then they were just gone’. Losing steering over the run, the German said his car was ‘too soft’ leading to ‘no corner speed’ and for Q3 he will change his shock set-up.
‘Frustrated’ was how Prumper’s team-mate Volker summed up his Q2. A two time winner in Muelheim-Kaerlich, the German said he was in the fight for a P2 but then spun his LRP powered BD7 with 3-laps to go. Admitting to ‘being a bit off the pace to Xray’, he said to get second would have been a good result. Changing his set-up for the heat, he said while they improved the car ‘so did the others’. Feeling they are still in the hunt against Xray he will make further set-up changes for the penultimate qualifier.
Feeling he had good pace in the opening qualifier but spinning his Awesomatix three times on his way to a P10, a chassis change would see Viljami Kutvonen set the fifth fastest time in Q2. Starting out with a carbon chassis on his A800 he said switching to aluminium made the car ‘much better’. Happy with how quickly he has been able to find a ‘good base set-up’ given the 2-minutes of practice drivers got in the good carpet, he said he will now tweak this to try and get more steering.
Traction rolling on his warm-up laps, Rheinard said he had ‘too much grip’. Having changed car for Q2, he said the roll lead him to drive a conservative heat but still he managed to crash hitting the board at the end of the straight which caused his servo to move. Running in front of Prumper on the timing screens for a time, he will try harder swaybars for the third qualifier. Behind Rheinard, his TRF team-mate Akio Sobue set the 7th fastest time followed by the Serpent of Viktor Wilck, Xray’s
Dionys Stadler and the Schumacher of British National Champion Elliott Harper.
View complete event results here.
View the event image gallery here.
