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April 27, 2019

ENS Rd1 TQ goes to Simon Kurzbuch

Getting off to the best possible start to regain his ENS title, Simon Kurzbuch has taking the bonus TQ point here in Italy as the only person who could take that away from him, Dario Balestri, was unable to better the time of his Swiss counterpart despite taking the final round. Dominic Greiner would take 2nd for the round to seal 4th overall on the grid, while starting ahead of him will be Carmine Raiola who was unable to better his Q1 and 2 results. Robert Pietsch will set off for tomorrow’s 45 minute A-main from 5th, ahead of fellow World Champion Lamberto Collari, who starts his home race in 6th. Simon, who took the TQ on tie break due to his blistering Q3 run, said he pushed hard at the start of Q4 to be in a position to respond to Dario but receiving the information over the radio from his father that the Infinity driver wouldn’t be able to beat him, he pulled off the track. Checking the forecast for tomorrow he will prepare his car as normal and maybe make some small changes if any rain is expected.

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April 27, 2019

Balestri takes Q2 with late charge

The 2nd round of qualifying for the 1/8th scale class at the season opening round of the 2019 Euro Nitro Series has gone to Dario Balestri. Putting in some very fast laps at the end of the run, the Italian was able to overhaul Simon Kurzbuch who ended the run in 2nd. Carmine Raiola took 3rd from the 2nd fastest heat while Dominic Greiner recovered from an unlucky Q1 yesterday to take 4th, in front of Mirko Salemi while top seed Robert Pietsch had a messy run to take sixth, the top 17 for the round covered by 5 seconds. Describing his run as ‘not perfect because of traffic’, Balestri elaborated by explaining that when you run close to a competitor in front of you at this track it affects the cars aerodynamics meaning you loose some time. Once passed and into clear air the run went a lot better and he was able to push for the rest of the run. His Max engine spluttering once passed the finish line, the World champion said he can’t do more, ‘fuel is marginal but everyone has the same problem’.

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April 27, 2019

Groskamp takes Q2 as rivals hit trouble

Jilles Groskamp has topped the 2nd round of qualifying here in sunny Bologna this morning, aided to some extent by problems for his competitors. Teemu Leino first hit trouble when his back pressure tube came off causing him to slow dramatically. This in turn forced a fast approaching Leo Arnold to take avoiding action, resulting in him clipping the pitlane and breaking both right side tires. Another to suffer a broken tire was Alessio Mazzeo who felt the damage occurred when he clipped the inside of the curb coming on the straight. Behind Groskamp was the inseparable Shepherd team lead by Worlds podium finisher Eduardo Escandon in 2nd, Thilo Todtmann in 3rd and Melvin Diekmann in 4th with Jakub Rozycki taking 5th. Having changed to a stiffer, and more importantly new, chassis plate on his IF15, Groskamp said the pace was similar but now much easier to drive, enabling him to carry more corner speed. Planning to make the rear suspension slightly stiffer for Q3, the Dutchman concluded by saying ‘so far I’m very happy, the pressure is now on the other guys’.

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April 26, 2019

Kurzbuch cuts it fine with fuel to take 1/8th Q1

Simon Kurzbuch has taken the opening round of qualifying at the ENS season opener in Bologna as a number of the leaders struggled with fuel on the last lap of the 4-minute qualifier. Carmine Raiola took the 2nd spot from the 2nd fastest heat, while Dario Balestri took 3rd having lead the heat until coming up dry on the final lap. Lamberto Collari took 4th on his home track while Mirko Salemi ended Q1 in 5th, just ahead of top seed Robert Pietsch who struggled with traffic at the beginning of the run which threw him out of his rhythm. Running out of fuel directly after crossing the line, Kurzbuch admitted that it was ‘really tight’ and he was lucky that the qualifying was over when his car came to a halt. Happy to take the first round TQ he said the first 2 minutes were good but then he came upon two other cars in the run but he wasn’t able to close the gap and so lost a lot of time in the final half of the run. Having flamed out at high speed, the Swiss driver will now check over his Novarossi engine for any potential damage.

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April 26, 2019

Q1 goes to Leo Arnold

Continuing on where he left off in timed practice Leo Arnold took the opening qualifier in Bologna ahead of the closely matched Infinity pairing of Jilles Groskamp and Teemu Leino. Alessio Mazzeo was 4th, despite running out of fuel, with Thilo Todtmann putting in a clean 4-minutes to take 5th. Describing his run as ‘pretty clean’ Arnold said he had only one slide and continued to compliment his new Xray saying the ‘car was perfect’, Xray seeming to make a big leap in performance with their 2019 car. Commenting that he needs ‘just one or two more good runs’ the French man’s plan for tomorrow’s remaining 3 qualifiers is to ‘leave the car as is’.

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April 26, 2019

Pietsch ends timed practice as top seed

Despite being one of only 3 drivers in the top 20 not to improve their time in the final timed practice session Robert Pietsch will go into qualifying as top seed. While the advantage he held after the opening practice was substantial, that gap was all but eroded away by the chasing pack with Dario Balestri putting in a much improved run to end up in 2nd just 1 tenth back. The World Champion despite being fast said his car was much too nervous and while it was not bad it was still not perfect. Dominic Greiner ended up in 3rd putting his improvement down to his driving and some tweaks to the OS engine in his Serpent and going into qualifying needs to make the car a bit more stable to have a good 4 minute pace. Despite also improving Simon Kurzbuch dropped 2 places to complete practice in 4th, just ahead of Lamberto Collari in 5th. In the 40+ class it was veteran Italian racer Stefano Solaroli who headed practice by a substantial 9 tenths over 3 laps followed by German Shepherd driver Andreas Giesa in 2nd with Austrian Rudi Scherer 3rd, while reigning champion Arie Manten and Alain Levy complete the top 5.

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April 26, 2019

Leo Arnold tops 1/10th seeding at ENS season opener

Leo Arnold is top seed for the 1/10th scale class at the ENS season opener in Bologna, the Xray driver improving on his CP1 time to go over 2 tenths quicker in his 2nd timed run. The Frenchman put his improvement down to changing to a shorter first gear which improved the drivability of his NT1. His team mate Alessio Mazzeo also improved his time but will stay as 3rd seed, behind Teemu Leino who failed to improve in the 2nd session having tried a different body shell but finding it much slower. Jilles Groskamp who was continuing experimenting with setup took 3rd in CP2 but being slightly slower than his CP1 time he ended practice 4th and will now revert to his setup from the final free practice session. The Shepherd trio of Melvin Diekmann, Eduardo Escandon and Thilo Todtmann complete the top 7 after practice.

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April 26, 2019

Robert Pietsch heads first timed practice by large margin

In the opening timed practice for the 1/8th scale class it was former world champion Robert Pietsch who was the clear leader, the Mugen driver some 5 tenths up on his nearest rival over 3 laps. Francesco Tironi was the best of the rest, the Italian driver heading another former World Champion Simon Kurzbuch in 3rd, with Andrea Pirani and current World Champion Dario Balestri completing the top 5. Asked about his rather large advantage on his rivals, the German put it down to a number of factors such as his good working relationship with his mechanic and new engines from sponsor OS which he says has more power which together makes for a better overall package. Looking ahead he doesn’t plan to make any changes to his Mugen, instead focusing on his driving saying ‘the track is easy, but it also very easy to push too much and go wide, losing a lot of time’, continuing ‘my main focus is stay calm and drive smoothly’.

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