Hoppe & Kröger win at German 1/8th IC Track Nats

This past weekend the German 1/8th IC Track Nationals were held at the Minidrom Ettlingen track in the South of the country. The crowd saw an exciting Class 1 final as it was a close battle for the victory between Lars Hoppe and Oliver Mack from the beginning of the race. Due to different fuel and tyre strategies the lead swapped numerous time during the final. Lars opted to change only the outside tyres at the third pitstop while Oliver changed all four tyres about mid-race. Before the final round of pitstops Oliver took over the lead with fresher tyres but Lars stayed behind closely. Lars entered the pits for his last stop first and a super fast pitstop of Thilo Tödtmann put some pressure on team Mack. A few laps later Oliver had his last pitstop and he returned to the track just behind Lars. For the final laps the distance was only a few meters but Lars put his head down and crossed the finishing line in first position to take his maiden German Championship title with Oliver Mack coming in 2nd and Merlin Depta rounding out the podium. In the Class 2 it was young David Kröger with a great drive in the final after winning the semi-final with a gap of four laps over the rest of the field. A small mistake in the first lap of the main final dropped him to the last position but for the rest of the race he showed a flawless performance. A few minutes before the end of the race David took over the lead and never looked back to take the German Championship title Class 2 as well as the Junior Champion title.

Source: Shepherd [team-shepherd.com]