RC Lemans Series Rd4 – Report
Round four of the RC Lemans Series was held at the EVMC club in Velp, The Netherlands over the weekend. Following cold and rainy low-grip conditions at the previous rounds all drivers were looking forward to a sunny weekend with asphalt temperatures of about 50 degree Celsius. In the LMP1 Modified class Sven Stoffels took the TQ only a couple of tenth of a second from championship leader Tim Altmann. Reinder Wilms matched Tim’s time down to a hundred of a second over the five minute run. Behind the three Philipp Paul, Kai Altmann, Tobias Weist, Andy Dick and Joachim Behnken were not far away, promising some exciting A-mains.
The LMP2 Stock class, usually around two seconds slower per lap, showed very fast laps this weekend with the cars only being one to 1.5 seconds slower. 2015 champion Sascha Lennartz grabbed a narrow TQ from Timo Schad with both being separated by one a couple of hundreds of a seconds. Local hero Mathijs Hermens came in third after the qualifiers, still in reach of the top positions. Kai Asmer, Franz-Jakob Reinartz and local Erwin Peters completed the top 6 for now.
In the opening LMP1 A-main Tim Altmann jumped into the lead instantly and he would bring home the win with the only 22-laps run in the main. Behind him the battle was on for the top 3 with Tim and Sven taking the other top spots, a second apart from Philipp, Tobias and Andy Dick. Things would tighten up even more in A2 with Reinder getting everything together in a nerve-wracking leg. Scoring 22 laps Reinder left Tobias, coming from the 6 spot on the grid, behind in second place while the fight was on for the remainder of the field until the checkered flag. At the end Sven Stoffels would bring home the third place three hundreds of a second from Tim Altmann who in turn had Philipp Paul in tow, again with three hundreds of a second. Another 0.02 seconds behind Kai ended the second leg in sixth place meaning position 3 to 6 were covered by less than a second. Before the start of the last and deciding A-main five drivers would be in the position to take the day’s win. Right from the start Tim would outperform the remainder of the field, taking the win half a lap from his brother Kai while scoring the fastest lap of the day with a 13.3s. Philipp Paul came in third from Tobias, Andy and Joachim, the latter three being in an impressive fight for the positions. Sven and Reinder, both able to score overall wins, had some bad luck in the main. Overall Tim scored the win from Sven with Tobias grabbing the final podium spot from Philipp in the tie-breaker.
The LMP2 class also had some very close fights to offer in the main finals. In A1 Sascha had to defend himself from a very fast yet fair Timo. With a minute to go Timo clipped a curb which gave Sascha much needed room to breathe, allowing him to take the win in A1. Mathijs, Kai, Franz-Jakob and Erwin would end the opening A-main matching their qualifying results. A2 saw Timo putting much pressure on Sascha but tight lines and the passing of backmarkers took their tolls, meaning Sascha would score another win, allowing him to take the overall win early. Mathijs would also profit of Timo’s small mistakes, allowing him to take the runner-up spot from Timo. Despite having already won Sascha also attended in A3, with both Timo and Mathijs being keen to beat him on the track. Right from the start the top 3 started to open a gap but around mid-race Sascha made a small mistake coming onto the straight, allowing Timo to take the lead. Sascha tried to take the position back which lead to an unfortunate collision between the two, with Mathijs being the lucky third. Now both Timo and Sascha waited for the chance to grab the lead but Mathijs defended his position by all means. In the final lap Timo tried to pass the leader but unfortunately both made contact and with great sportsmanship and under the applause of the spectators Timo waited for Mathijs to recover. Then, with a last corner attack Timo tried the best he could to grab the lead but he failed and so Mathijs grabbed the win by 0.09s, securing him the overall runner-up spot from Timo.
Source: RC-Lemans [rc-lemans.de]
