Friday was the occasion for all pilots and mechanics to meet after a long wintry break. Free practice was to be four 10-minute sessions of two mixed series. However, listening to the opinions of various pilots, many appreciated the method at the French Cup (Thionville) which used a system with a name card⦠something to think about. The weather on Friday was cloudy with strong winds, which thankfully tended to dry the track. The following pilots showed themselves to be very fast from their first lap: Jacky Mouton, Arnaud Chaussard, Nicolas Bougnoteau, Thomas Desmarie, and Joffrey Defie. These pilots had arrived for practice a few weeks before, which allowed them to adjust their chassis to be competitive right from the beginning.
Qualifications (Saturday)
There were awesome battles during the three qualification rounds. The coveted pole position went to Jacky Mouton followed by Arnaud Chaussard, Joffrey Defie and Nicolas Bougnoteau. Thomas Desmarie fell only a few hundredths of a second short of going directly into the finale.
Sub-Final and Main Final (Sunday)
The Elite finale would take place on a wet track. Again there was an awesome battle at the beginning of finale between Thomas Desmarie, Basile Concialdi, and Arnaud Chaussard. In the middle, Basile Concialdi encountered a small radio problem which allowed Thomas Eytard to take over his position, and even that of Arnaud Chaussard! Thus at the end the finale saw the following finish order: Thomas Desmarie, Thomas Eytard, and Arnaud Chaussard. It was also a beautiful performance by Basile Concialdi who finished in 4th place despite his radio problems.
Final results:
1. Thomas Desmaries 2. Thomas Eytard XRAY NT1
3. Arnaud Chaussard XRAY NT1
4. Basile Concialdi XRAY NT1
5. Nicolas Bougnoteau
6. Jacky Mouton
7. Mickael Derderian
8. Mickael Pontal
9. Joeffriy Defie 10. Thomas Guillon XRAY NT1
All-in-all we spent a pleasant weekend whether it was on the track or in the stands.
