Nogaro 2007

4th race European Truck Racing Cup on circuits 2007

Bösiger reigned on Saturday and shared the steps of winners with Vršecký on Sunday

Couple of our pilots with Buggyras Markus Bösiger and David Vršecký introduced themselves excellently on the circuit of Paul Armagnac in Gascony in the southwest of France during another enterprise of the European Cup. Helvetian rider won both rides without problems and also David almost touched a triumph and could also stand on the steps of fame, if it were not for the aggressive attacks of some riders. He even stood there by one leg already but in both opportunities there was someone to spoil his happiness. But he had his time on Sunday when he finished in the third position just behind Markus in the qualifying race – and they repeated their success also in the cup ride. After the fourth act Markus leads sovereignly and although David lost a tight contact with Albacete, the bigger advantage he gained against now fourth Körber, who beat his fellow countryman Hahn.

However, David entered the circuit charts markedly in the Saturday time practice. As the first rider in history he pushed his time in a duel with chronometer below one minute and 53 seconds, with which he exceeded the last year’s record of Hahn by two and a half seconds. However, Markus was faster after the start of the qualifying race and began to lead. David didn’t want to allow their mutual collision and made him room. He did not know there is the former pilot of Buggyra – Körber – glued on Markus’s back bumper who as an experienced master got drawn to the second position like this. But blue Buggyra was stronger than yellow MAN and so David attacked already in the first round. He would finish the manoeuvre successfully if it were not for Körber’s fellow countryman Hahn who knocked David from behind and sent him off track. David’s return did not last long but meanwhile four riders overtook him – a chasing ride from the sixth position started. He overtook domestic Belloc in two rounds and the same time it took to overtake fourth Hahn. Albacete was just before him in the following round but the truck did not have enough power for further movement ahead. “Start could be better but if Hahn did not send me out of track I could be behind Markus. After the punch it was harder to keep an ideal track,“ commented David his first weekend contest for points after the arrival to depo.

Cup race had similar scenario. With the difference that Körber in the first line hesitated at start and David behind him was forced to slow down. And like dogs behind hare, this time Albacete and Austrian Allgäuer used Markus as a shield. David was fifth behind Körber. During the following six rounds the leading couple made some gap while David followed the yellow team couple like a blue tick and was obviously faster. In the middle of the race he therefore decided to attack and made Körber to apply his brakes. In the following round he overtook also Allgäuer, but Allgäuer could not bear it and punched David in the nearest curve. An involuntary trip to the rescue zone and fall to the sixth position was the result. This was also the final placement, although only eight tenths of a second were between David and the third position in post! ”I did maximum but I wasn’t able to override anyone. The car almost couldn’t keep track sometimes,“ David reported to transmitter immediately after the wave of the chessboard flag. Inspection in depo revealed he was driving with totally scattered geometry of the first axle! “Never mind, I will attack the box on Sunday,” he said shortly after the tenth evening hour and retired to rest.

Albacete was the most successful in Sunday practice but both second Markus and third David were only tiny several hundredth of a second behind. Hahn in the fourth position was losing almost a second. The worse was that David had to terminate the practice prematurely. After pulling the truck to depo, mechanists immediately found a failure of gearbox. Another duel with time started because mere one hour was remaining till the beginning of the qualifying race. What a pity there is no category for the duration of changing gearbox in the Guinness Book of World Records, mechanists of Buggyra would certainly provide for a new entry – the exchange took them less than twenty minutes!!!

Moreover their work was of top quality, as usually. David kept the third position after start without problems and followed Albacete and Markus closely. Hahn tried to trouble about for a while but after several rounds he realised he couldn’t keep the pace of the leading trio and made a race of his own. The main field drove with a big loss, though Markus achieved the fastest time during the race, it was not sufficient to override Albacete. He rather had to watch over David who got to a close contact in the last rounds. “Absolute satisfaction – first I worried whether I would drive at all and then I leisurely gained points for the third position. I think Markus drove more slowly in the end when he found out he couldn’t overtake Antonio. That is why also I did not try to attack, there had been more than enough bad luck already,“ David evaluated the situation in several sentences.

In the introduction of the main race Hahn penetrated behind Albacete and Markus for a while but David was third again soon. We can say that also the cup race was a game of three riders because the rest of Europe was more and more delayed. In about a middle of the fourteen rounds it seemed Markus could attack the leading position but Spaniard immediately speeded up and increased his advantage by two tenth of a second. In the next phase of the race David approached Markus but there was no rain even from this cloud. Due to the fact none of the trio made a mistake, their order remained the same like in the qualifying race. David was happy he confirmed his words from Saturday and jumped with Markus to the steps of the winners.