Once again the Portuguese Open was the first official race which represents the start of the 2012 season. The race was held at Evora in southern Portugal. After a long 500km trip in the morning, we arrived at the track on Saturday to get some practice during the afternoon and tried to find the best set-up for this very technical track.
On Sunday morning we had the qualification heats, where I got TQ followed by Bruno Coelho and Nuno Rebelo (XB9).
The weather turned very cold, and in my semi I had some problems and had to push hard to bump up to the A-main. Once there, I had a hard time getting the engine tuned right, mainly because of the very low temperatures at the track. I flamed out, and the engine was still too rich. Anyway, I still managed to get 3rd on the final lap.
A shout out goes out to Nuno Rebelo, who has done a very consistent race with his all-new XB9, managing to get two XB9 at the podium.
Final results:
1. Ricardo Monteiro 2. Nuno Rebelo â“ XRAY XB9
3. Carlos Duraes â“ XRAY XB9
4. Pedro Figueiredo
5. Nuno Casal Ribeiro
6. Joao Lopes
7. Fernando Almeida
8. Joao Carlos Figueiredo
9. Carlos Hugo Ferreira
10. Joao Gomes
