Jochen Hahn in his family-run Team Hahn Racing Iveco won the opening race of the FIA European Truck Racing Championship round six held at Most this afternoon.
Jochen Hahn in his family-run Team Hahn Racing Iveco won the opening race of the FIA European Truck Racing Championship round six held at Autodrom Most this afternoon.
Starting from pole position, German ace Hahn took his fourth win of the season ahead of championship leader Adam Lacko (Buggyra International Racing System Freightliner) and Norbert Kiss (Team Tankpool24 Racing Mercedes-Benz).
Pole-sitter Jochen Hahn led the pack away with Norbert Kiss resisting an early attack from local hero Adam Lacko to hang on to second place. Once ahead, Hahn was unstoppable, leading at the end of the opening lap by 1.3s and that advantage continued to increase as the race wore on.
Behind the reigning champion, a great battle raged for second place. Having fended off a challenge from Steffi Halm (MAN), Lacko, whose engine mysteriously cut out at the first corner of the race, started to close the gap to Kiss, the two running nose to tail at the end of lap four. Lacko attacked at turn one starting lap five but Kiss defended perfectly, with the delayed Lacko coming under attack from Halm and Antonio Albacete (Truck Sport Lutz Bernau MAN) who had lost ground at the start after being forced wide in the opening corners.
To deafening cheers from the partisan crowd, Lacko dived past Kiss at the Meritor corner on lap five to secure second spot and then set off in pursuit of Hahn, with the leading margin now up to 3.5s. Lacko was closer a lap later, the gap down to 3.2s, and then it fell to 2.5s after seven of the 11 tours. With eight laps done, Lacko was just 1.8s off the leader with the crowd urging him on, but the gap eventually stabilised at 1.7s allowing Hahn to secure a fourth win of the season. Lacko never gave up but Hahn displayed his years of truck racing experience to withstand the pressure and manage the gap to run out as the victor.
Behind the top two, Kiss came under attack from Halm who hung on to fourth place despite constant pressure from Albacete. Sascha Lenz (SL Trucksport MAN) took sixth ahead of the second Freightliner in the hands of the popular former champion, and another local, David Vršecký. Ryan Smith (Team OXXO Energy MAN) won the Battle of Britain to stay ahead of fellow countryman Shane Brereton (in his ex-Jochen Hahn MAN), while Gerd Körber (Team Shwabentruck Iveco) rounded out the top 10.
The third Czech driver on the FIA ETRC grid, Frankie Vojtisek (MAN) took 11th place ahead of French Cup regular Grzegorz Ostaszewski aboard the sole Renault on the grid, with Erwin Kleinnagelvoort’s Scania next in the queue. Eduardo Rodrigues (MAN) and a troubled Dominique Orsini (Mercedes-Benz) rounded out the 16 finishers.
Brereton scored his fourth Promoter’s Cup win in the row, following a hat-trick bagged at the Hungaroring the week before. Frankie Vojtisek in his Czech Truck Racing Team MAN scored second with Jose Rodrigues recovering to third in the cup.