Borković the seventh
Cyan Racing ace Ted Bjerk won Race 1 of the final competition weekend of the FIA TCR World Tour at the Macau Guia circuit.
The former WTCC champion started from pole position and his lead was threatened only once, on the first start. Bjerka was joined on the podium by BRC Hyundai pilots Norbert Mihelis and Mikel Askona. This arrangement leaves Mihelis in first place in the general standings, Bjerk is still second, but with a halved gap that now amounts to only 5 points, he says Serbiaring.
It started with a traditional incident. At the start, Ma stayed buried, whose “lynk&co03” was hit by local driver Gary Kwok. In the rush to the first braking, Mihelis overtook Jan Erlacher, which will turn out to be the Hungarian racer’s key maneuver today.
On the approach to the San Francisco curve, there was another accident, initiated by Esteban Guerrieri, who too optimistically approached the Lisbon curve and made a mistake on braking. In an attempt to get back on the racing path, he ran into the sister “grey” of Marko Buti. Guerrieri’s car got in the way and, in tandem with one of the local Hyundais, completely blocked the track. The race was therefore stopped after only three corners, and neither Guerrieri nor Ma, as well as John Philippi, participated in the new start.
Cleaning up the mess of broken cars, fallen parts, debris, spilled liquids and repairing damaged fences took more than half an hour. The distance was increased from 10 to 11 laps, and the restart was performed behind the safety car and according to the order recorded at one of the measuring points after the first start.
The column was led by Bjerk ahead of Ascona, Michelis, Erlacher and Girolami. The BRC “Elantras” performed a team rollover and Ascona passed Mihelis to second place while braking for Lisbon. A convoy of six cars, in the order Bjerk-Mihelis-Askona-Erlacher-Girolami-Haf, quickly separated from the followers and passed the checkered flag in this order. The duel between Ascona and Erlacher provided several exciting moments, and even more dramatic was the battle between Girolami and Huff for the 5th position. The Argentinian worked hard defensively, but resisted, while the Englishman deserves praise for his heroic performance. Huff started fifteenth today and finished sixth, which gives him a good chance to fight for victory and improve his balance on the most complicated street track in the world on Sunday’s partially inverted start.
Serbian participant of the FIA TCR World Tour, Dušan Borković, started 10th because he was pushed back 3 places due to a penalty for pushing a competitor in qualifying. He luckily survived the drama at the first start and subsequently drove to 7th position.
Bjerk’s triumph and Erlacher’s fourth place secured the team title for Lynk&Co Cijan Racing. In the overall ranking of drivers, Mihelis still leads with 305 points, followed by Bjerk (300), and Erlacher and Askona (both 279), who are theoretically also in the game for the title. After an early withdrawal, Guerrieri remained at 266 points and his championship ambitions are over because on Sunday it is possible to win a maximum of 30 more points.
The starting grid for the second sprint is determined by the inversion of the top ten in today’s performance, which means that local racer David Zhu will start from pole position. Among the TCR World Tour pilots, Borković has the best position, who will start fourth and will have only local competitors in front of him. Girolami, Erlacher, Askona, Mihelis and Bjerk will line up behind him up to the fifth row.
Race 2 will give the 2024 champion, the expected duration is 10 laps, and the start is scheduled for 3:55 CET.
Source:
Serbiaring.com
Source: autoblog.rs
