Curse the rain !

On the back of a fine win in the previous round of the French Championships, Benjamin Bailly worked himself into the position to win the European ICA championship race. Driving a canny race in order to dispute the final in the best possible shape, Benjamin, with the able support of his team, had got everything carefully worked out to battle for the title. Well, almost everything…

Benjamin Bailly’s disappointment was all the greater for the hopes he had raised during the European Championships. It all started at the semi-final meeting at Thy-Hanstholm in Denmark during the weekend of 15-16 July. The idea was to be amongst the 70 drivers selected to contest the final stages out of a field of 220. Benjamin got past this first hurdle with flying colours. “I was going really well in Denmark. Right from the off I won a pole position and I ended up winning two out of my three heats. I decided not to take any risks in the final, because I knew that the slightest problem or skirmish on the track might stop me qualifying. In the end everything went fine and I took third place on the podium.”

According to team manager Olivier Maréchal, the Belgian driver from Liège arrived on the German track in Amfing brimming with confidence. “Benjamin has reached a point where he is now very competitive at the highest level. The understanding between him and Jan Daems, who is his support man in the team, is perfect. That means Benjamin goes into a race with a clear head. Although he’s very fast he’s also a very cool customer, which is a vital asset in a sport in which the pressure on these young drivers is intense”.

The 16-year old Belgian put together his race patiently and efficiently. “With such a small quota of tyres at my disposal I thought I’d better do my best to preserve them during the heats”, explained Benjamin. Despite that, he still managed to come fourth in qualification. Unlike many of his rivals, who made the choice to mount their two new spare tyres for the pre-finals, Benjamin and his team decided to hold back their spares for the final. Driving a perfectly set up Kosmic-Vortex combo, he managed to move up one place in order to get onto the inside of the second row for the final. That’s when his chances of victory evaporated. A sudden downpour soaked the track just as the drivers were taking up their positions on the starting grid.

“Normally in this sort of situation the marshals would send us back to the paddock to fit rain tyres, at least that’s always what’s happened in my experience. But to everyone’s surprise, they ordered the race to go ahead. In track conditions like that I had no grip at all. By saving my new tyres for the final I knew I would have an advantage over my rivals, but it all backfired on me. On a dry track you normally break in a new set of tyres in less than a lap but in the wet you need more like fifteen laps!” For Benjamin, and for many others besides, the race suddenly turned into a nightmare, with karts crashing into each other and skidding all over the place. He did manage to keep out of trouble, but with no grip he had to fall back into the middle of the pack. “To be honest, I reckon I had all the aces in hand and would have won this European Championship race had it been run on the dry. If only the race marshals had let us fit our rain tyres I would have been OK. As it turned out, I had to wait almost until the end of the race before I started to get any grip to get up amongst the top 10”.

The Kosmic driver chalked up a fastest lap time of 58″880, whereas the winner never lapped in under 59″300. But still, coming 9th in a European Championship race with a field of 220 entries is an excellent result by any standard. Benjamin Bailly will have plenty of chance to get his revenge with French Championship and World Cup races coming up soon