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| Race report by Kennie Ekenstierna |
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This weekend Team XRAY Sweden had an awesome result at the Swedish cup through Kennie Ekenstierna and Henrik Nilsson through TQ, Win and third place.
The track in Höör is a very technical track, it has three uphill curves, concrete tiles, triple and double jumps, astroturf, wooden slats and clay. When we arrived to the track on Saturday morning the track was soaking wet and it was still raining. The track needed a lot of sawdust on the clay area to dry up quicker. The race organizers decided to skip the first practice round and prepare the track instead.
Eventually the rain stopped and the track quickly started to dry up and the qualifications started:
Q 1- Kennie won the round
Q 2- Kennie 4th, with some electronic problems
Q 3- Kennie 2nd
Q 4- Kennie won the round again
Q 5- Kennie 2nd again
It was a thriller into the end of Q5, three possible TQ drivers, Christoffer Svensson and
Johan Balsberg with each 1st & 2nd place, and Kennie with two 1st & one 2nd place.
They had to win the last round and beat Kennie´s best time, 8 laps 5.25.xxx.
Johan B won Q5, but he didn´t beat the time, lost TQ with 1 second. Kennie was the TQ.
The car was really working great for Kennie as he didn´t need to change anything since his practice the week before. Kennie were driving Proline Diamondback tires x3 and x4 and was very satisfied with the car. In the afternoon the track was almost dry and it got better and better as the day went by.
Sunday morning, time for finals and the sun was shining. The organizers had sweeped the track from sawdust, the clay was dry and in perfect condition. The only thing Kennie was stressed about was which tires he should drive on, Diamondback x3 or x4 in the dry conditions. Kennie chose to drive on x4 at the semifinal because he were running low on x3 which he wanted to save for the main final.
In Semi A Kennie started at pole position and ended at 1st. In Semi B the winner was one second slower than in Semi A, which made Kennie the overall TQ. Fellow Team XRAY Sweden driver Henrik Nilsson managed to get 6th place for the main final. The only thing Kennie changed before the Main final was to X3 tires and thicker oil in the shocks. The Main final started and Kennie took the lead the 1st lap, then he made a small misstake, dropped to 2nd but still 20 meters in front of the 3rd car and only increasing. After a few laps Kennie took the lead again and kept it through the final, increasing even more, ended up with 2 laps ahead 2nd & 3rd car.
As Kennie was steaming through the race there was a closer match between Balsberg and Henrik Nilsson for 2nd. In the end Henrik Nilsson was able to close the gap down tojust a few seconds on the last lap, but Balsberg proved stable under pressure and could collect the 2nd place. Team XRAY Sweden made a lucky weekend, Kennie Ekenstierna 1st place and TQ & Henrik Nilsson 3rd place at the podium. Team XRAY Sweden had a really good teamwork throughout the weekend with many drivers putting in a good effort both for themselves and for their team-mates.
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| Final results: |
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1. Ekenstierna Kennie - XRAY XB8
2. Balsberg Johan
3. Nilsson Henrik - XRAY XB8
4. Palsson Mikael
5. Svensson Mikael
6. Boklund Simon
7. Palsson Jessica
8. Sjöberg Martin
9. Borell Axel
10. Edvinsson Andreas
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