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My mechanic and I arrived at the track on Saturday before noon, and many drivers were already there looking for the right setup for such a fast circuit. We where not in a great hurry because I knew the track quite well from past years and also from the Euro B 1:8 . I also knew that we are always allowed to drive until 8:00PM in the evening!
Due to the fact that it was the last race before the EC in Spain, I first began to run-in a new engine. I also tried some different gearing since the straight is very long, similar to the one in Spain. Traugott tried some different setups in perspective to the EC out.
It was soon clear that the top three drivers of the championship (Waelti, Stammler, and Schaer) would fight once more for the pole. Mattia Pesenti had the advantage of racing at his home track and knew exactly every centimeter but had big problems with fuel which didnâ™t last 5min and so he had to make an additional pit stop.
At 5:00PM we started the first grouped practice which allowed us to check the timing system and for the drivers to have an idea where they ranked. The first four were: Wälti, Stammler, Schaer and Pasquin. Result: 3 XRAY NT1 cars and 1 Mugen. |
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On Sunday we had a beautiful weather with approximately 30°C. We started first with grouped practice followed by three qualifying runs. This time Dirk Stammler was the pole man followed by myself, Traugott Schaer and Claudio Pasquin. After the semi-final, Pollet-Villard, Bognuda, Moretti, Ackermann, Marzini, and Pesenti also got into the main final. This time there were 5 XRAY NT1 cars qualified for the final.
The 30min final began with a very bad start by Stammler. Due to this mistake, Schaer and I overtook him before the first curve. In lap 6 I made a driving mistake and lost nearly half a lap. At the same time, Stammler`s engine flamed out due to a defective glowplug. Traugott Schaer was leading now. After approximately 10min, Stammler suddenly lost connection from the leading group and had to give up with a defective belt.
It was now a duel between Schaer and me. He was leading with about half a lap before the last pit stop. With the entry to pit stop, his engine unfortunately flamed out, whereby he lost almost a whole lap. As a consequence, I won the third race consecutively and as a conclusion was crowned as the new Swiss Champion 2007 in the 200mm class!
1 Beat Wälti XRAY NT1
2 Traugott Schär XRAY NT1
3 Walter Pollet-Villard
4 Yuri Bognuda
5 Claudio Pasquin XRAY NT1
6 Fabio Marzini
7 Giacomo Moretti XRAY NT1
8 Monika Ackerman XRAY NT1
9 Mattia Pesenti
10 Dirk Stammler |
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I would like to thank my mom and dad :-) and of course my mechanic Roland for the super achievement over the whole weekend. Thanks to T&M Models, HUDY and XRAY for the support, as well as MRTM for the perfectly-organized weekend in Lostallo. Last but not least, thanks to Daniel for the poor-German-to-good-English report translation.
Greetings from Switzerland.
Beat Wälti
Swiss Champion 2007 |
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