Last weekend was Round 5 of the Dutch National and I won the race! The car worked just perfectly!
Last weekend it was only a week ago when we came from the European Championship in Luxembourg but this weekend it was time for Round 5 of the Dutch National at the beautiful track in Apeldoorn.
On Saturday we had some practice until 15:00h because then the showers came down and made the track wet and it was not possible to dry before 17:00h.
We tried softer tires and it seemed to work a lot better on the RB-powered XRAY RX8. Furthermore we experimented with some slight changes to the rear geometry. Roll-centers and camber change settings made the car faster in tight corners. We were happy and called it a day just before the rain came.
On Sunday the Top 4 were very close in qualifying. In Q1, I had the lead until the last minute. Due to a lot of tire wear my car pulled to the right on the straight and I hit the grass and went off.
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In Q2, I had a perfect run and had provisional pole with 29 laps @ 7:08.82 closely followed by Steven Cuijpers with 29 laps @ 7:08.88
In Q3, I decided not to defend my pole but rather to test tires for the final. The track was a bit faster because of the rising temperatures so Rick and Steven were able to defeat my Q2 time by 1 full second. Rick had 29 laps @ 7:07.2 and Steven @ 7:07.5. I was in 3rd place and that was enough for direct placement into the final.
Ranking after qualifying:
1. Rick Vrielijnck
2. Steven Cuypers 3. John Ermen XRAY RX8
4. Gunther van Steay
5. Arie Manten
At the start of the final everyone had a clean start and I was able to take 2nd place before the first corner. I was then on Rick's tail and was able to get a clean pass just before the first fuel stop. I then pulled away from the field and had a clean run to take home the win. After the tire changes, Steven had passed Rick and could close the gap to 4 seconds, but is was not enough and I took the win.
After the 30 mins. final this was the result:
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1. John Ermen XRAY RX8
2. Steven Cuypers
3. Rick Vrielijnck
4. Arie Manten
5. Frank Baggen
I would like to thank my sponsors: XRAY, RC-Connect, R&B, Contact Tires and Tornado fuel for the support and of course my dad and Ismail for the fast pit stops and perfectly executed tire change.
