Adam Lacko excites the home fans giving them an experience of listening to the Czech anthem

30.08.2020 07:45

A brilliant start and subsequent successful manoeuvres lifted the home Buggyra Racing team driver Adam Lacko from spot number five to the top of the Saturday Race 2 counting for the European Truck Racing Championship (ETRC). The event is hosted under the traditional name of TOTAL Czech Truck Prix by the Most Autodrom circuit for the twenty-eight time this weekend. Adam was fiercely kept attacking by Sascha Lenz and Norbert Kiss driving MAN trucks all race long, but the experienced matador gave them no chance. He drove to victory receiving an enthusiastic ovation from the fans. Kiss had to settle for sixth eventually after having been penalized, which resulted in Jochen Hahn, a six-time European champion, moving into third place.

Showing an excellent performance, Adam raised the spirits after the opening race, when his not very successful qualifying efforts resulted in finishing just below the podium, in a fourth place. “I was pushed by desire and power to win on the home circuit. My rivals didn’t leave me at rest at any point. But I pulled it off and I’m so glad that I’ve succeeded. It’s a shame the traditionally numerous attendances at Most had to be reduced. Nevertheless, it’s nice that the grandstands didn’t lay empty as in the case of other motor sporting events,” said the nice driver at the finish.

In race one, Hungarian Kiss proved a dominant force ahead of Lenz and Hahn. In race two, the top eight drivers started in reverse order. This meant that Lacko’s team-mate, Buggyra Racing team owner Martin Koloc’s only sixteen-year-old daughter, Aliyyah, had to cope with an extremely difficult task making her debut in a truck. Having finished eighth in race one, she started from pole position in race two. At first, Aliyyah was resisting a crushing pressure from the five-tonne monsters “on her tail”, but in the end she retired experiencing an off-track excursion due to a flat rear tyre punctured in traffic on the very first lap.

Part of the race weekend is a traditional Renault Clio Cup Central Europe support series with the Czech driver Tomáš Pekař defending his title. After two season-opening events at Poznań, Poland and at the Lausitzring in Germany, he has comfortably settled at the top of the standings bringing a large thirty-point advantage to Most. Nevertheless, the first Saturday race didn’t turn out the way he had imagined it. Although the Czech favourite showed a spirited pursuit from sixth on the grid, it was not enough for a better finish position than his fourth place. He has another go on Sunday.

Then the Autodrom circuit history was changed by an attractive series that is new at Most this year. Maxx Formula introduced the modern-day F1, GP2, F3000, IndyCar, and Super League Formula single-seaters manufactured between the 1990s and 2010. It had been clear since the Friday timed sessions that the circuit would see a new track record in the car category. This can only be achieved in an official race, which became a reality as early as Saturday. During the second race on Sunday, the spectators can witness attempts to break the new record set by Austrian Bernd Herndlhofer in 1m22.981s driving an Arrows A22. This way, it was by almost three seconds that he broke the eleven years old benchmark set by a Mercedes C-Klasse DTM driven by Stefan Mücke of Germany.

The Seyffarth Audi Sport R8 LMS Cup, Tourenwagen Legenden, and Tourenwagen Revival series have brought magnificent battles as well.

The race weekend at Most, which continues with Sunday races, includes the Czech Truck Prix as the first European Truck Racing Championship (ETRC) event held this season as the coronavirus pandemic has resulted in the first two events planned at the Nürburgring in Germany and the Slovakia Ring near Bratislava, respectively, being cancelled. Even the Czech Truck Prix, which is the most prestigious and most visited event on the Autodrom Most calendar every year, has seen some restrictions. The measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus have forced the closing of the paddock for the public, division of the premises into sectors, and a limit on the number of spectators to a maximum of 4,000 on each of the week-end days.

The European Truck Racing Championship series is to comprise only six rounds this year. If there are no unpredictable circumstances, Most will be followed by Zolder, Belgium (on 12th and 13th September), Jarama, Spain (on 26th and 27th September), Hungaroring, Hungary (on 17th and 18th October), the famous Le Mans circuit in France (on 7th and 8th November), and Misano, Italy (on 14th and 15th November). But the situation has been developing and changing all the time. For example, Hungary is going to close its frontiers due to coronavirus for one month starting on 1st September.

During this pandemic-shortened season, the Autodrom Most company will host two of its flagship race weekends. Besides the Czech Truck Prix, the European OMV MaxxMotion NASCAR Show series shall take place on 14th and 15th November instead of the original date in June.

 

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