On last week, I attended my 20th Euros in Spain with the XRAY team. It was for me the 1st time I raced on such a high grip / high speed track with the new XB8'16 so it was a big challenge.
We started the race with our basic set-up which has been very good on all the track I raced and tested lastly. Due to high temperature, we went harder in shock oil at the very beginning of practice. Then the fast corner of this track were needing the car to be more supported comparing to our usual tracks so we changed our diff setup from 5/7/3 to 7/10/5 and finally used 10/15/5 for the end of qualifying and mains.
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During all qualifying, the car was good and super easy to drive but a little slow comparing to the competitors. I did not take care much about best laps but focused on consistency and was able to secure the semi early which allowed us to test different things for the last round of qualifying. I did not mind to be 8, 12 or 16 in qualifying but I really wanted to have the best car for the mains which we succeeded to get.
The last minor changes (thicker front sway bar and rear arms pills outside on suspension holders) made the car absolutely perfect and I knew after semi practice that my car was competitive and it was now all depending on my driving. In semi, I made a mistake in very first corner and started last but I had a good speed and drove consistent the rest of semi which allowed me to finish 3rd very close to the first 2 guys.
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Before the main, I knew that my pit strategy should allow me to pit one time less than other drivers so at the start, I decided to drive safe and try to stay in the pack. My car has been super easy and consistent during the 45 minutes main even if the conditions in term of grip and temperature were really extreme. I had a nice fight for the 4th place during most of the main and when 10 minutes to the end, some front runners have encountered some technical issues, it became a fight for podium spot which was awesome for me! I succeeded to keep my head cool and drove consistent till the end to get the 2nd place of this European championship.
I'm really happy with this result which is a big achievement for all my sponsors, mechanic and team mates. A great team work!!
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Final results:
1. Elliott Boots 2. Yannick Aigoin â“ XRAY XB8
3. Neil Cragg
4. Darren Bloomfield
5. Juan Carlos Canas
6. Davide Ongaro
7. Bryan Baldo
8. Oscar Baldo
9. Marco Baruffolo
10. Robert Battle
11. David Ronnefalk 12. Martin Wollanka - XRAY XB8
