Team France Sarno – Wednesday Day 3 – Qualifying and first races

It was even hotter this Wednesday at Sarno in relentless sunshine. After a final free session as a warm-up, the Rotax Max Challenge Grand Finals drivers finally started the competition in their Timed Practice session. They followed in the afternoon with their first Qualifying Heat.

The times showed great promise with superb performances by Andy Ratel, poleman in Mini Max, Guillaume Treillard de Quinemont 4th in Senior and Paul Fourquemin 7th, and Nicolas Picot and Lucas Joly 3rd and 4th in DD2.

The battle was fierce from the first heats with some disappointments, but also some confirmations and recoveries. The spoiler penalties were numerous, a factor that will have to be better taken into account in the future. In Senior, the French chances may have been lost with retirements for Paul and Guillaume during their first heat. Fortunately, Andy’s 2nd place in Mini and Nicolas and Lucas’ double in DD2 were among the pleasant moments of this hot day.

Mini Max – Compkart: Ratel on pole position

Andy Ratel managed the Timed Practice perfectly and was the fastest on the penultimate lap. His time of 1’05”241 gave him pole position with a lead of 323 thousandths. Paul Alberto took 5th place and Jolan Raccamier 6th by a short distance. Karel Schulz was 23rd with a gap of 5 tenths.

In the first Qualifying Heat, Andy was fighting for victory. Despite an attempt on the last lap, he cleverly secured 2nd place. The fight was very close in the leading group and the positions varied a lot. Jolan managed to finish in 3rd position, followed by Paul, who set the fastest lap, for a good French group. Karel fell to the back of the pack on the first lap, but still gained a few places.

Junior Max – Praga

Qualifying was not favourable overall for the French camp with less convincing results than during the Free Practice sessions. Our four starters were in the first session, much slower than the second. Their honourable performances in the group of odd-numbered drivers did not allow them to obtain such a rewarding overall ranking. Noam Abramczyk was the best in 18th place, Sacha Maguet finished 25th, Téo Blin 36th and Enzo Caldaras 37th. Nothing catastrophic, but still disappointing. 

The first heat (A-B) saw an improvement. Sacha made a good climb up eight places to reach the top five, while Noam came back to 6th. Enzo finished 16th on the track (+3 places), but a spoiler penalty relegated him to 21st place. Téo was in the top 10 of the C-D heat with a gain of eight places in the battle.

Senior Max – Sodi
Guillaume Treillard de Quinemont had an excellent performance with the 3rd fastest time, while Paul Fourquemin was 5th. César Gazeau was in the top 10 of the even-numbered drivers, while Florian Bourdon was behind. In the ranking, Treillard was in good shape in 4th place, Fourquemin was 7th and Gazeau was 18th.
Caesar regained ground in the A-B heat with a 6th place finish. Florian made a good start and took advantage of his experience to finally regain seven places. The C-D heat was catastrophic for the French clan. Guillaume and Paul were regrettably involved in a serious incident that caused them to lose both a lot of places and much of their hopes. Guillaume finished 22nd and the unfortunate Paul 29th.

DD2 – Birel ART : Picot and Joly on the front row
The two Frenchmen did a very good job by each setting the 2nd fastest time in their session. Nicolas Picot and Lucas Joly, respectively 3rd and 4th in the overall classification, could be proud and confidently continue their qualifying journey in the DD2 heats. They did their job perfectly during the C-D heat where Nicolas was leading alone while Lucas climbed from 4th place on lap 1 to take 2nd place.

DD2 Master – Sodi: fastest lap in the race for Champion
8th in the even-numbered Qualifying session, Rudy Champion was 19th overall, the first session having been faster this time. With the fastest lap in the race, he climbed from 9th to 6th place in his first heat, but lost four places due to a dropped spoiler.

Info Kartcom with Kartlink / © Photos KSP