It was a warm, sunny afternoon on the Slovakia Ring with temperatures of 28° for the Final of the European OK Championship #3. Thibaut Ramaekers (KR/Iame) shared the front row of the grid with Noah Monteiro (KR/Iame), Louis Iglesias (CRG/Iame) and Joe Turney (KR/Iame) occupied the second row ahead of Matheus Morgatto (Birel ART/TM) and Jimmy Hélias (KR/Iame).
After a number of formation laps, the green lights finally came down on the 36 finalists, who immediately showed their nervousness with five retirements in the first lap, including Gabriel Gomez (CRG/Iame), Andy Consani (Sodi/TM), Oleksandr Bondarev (KR/Iame) and Zac Drummond (Parolin/TM). Ramaekers led against Monteiro and Turney, then Dmitry Matveev (KR/Iame) and Hélias. Matveev moved up to 3rd place on the third lap, with Hélias joining him ahead of Turney on the following lap. Iglesias, who had been severely pushed around on the first lap, had lost 12 places to 15th, while Andrea Dupé (KR/Iame) had made up 14 places to 19th. Ramaekers increased his advantage to a full second over Monteiro on lap 7, with Matveev following by over two seconds with Hélias hot on his heels. Scott Lindblom (KR/Iame) was back in 5th ahead of Fionn Mclaughlin (KR/Iame), then Turney in 7th. Noah Wolfe (Birel ART/TM) and Rillaerts joined the list of retirements. Ramaekers set the fastest time at the halfway stage, and his lead grew to 1.8″. After that, the relatively large gaps didn’t allow for much overtaking. Ramaekers confirmed his progress in OK with a magnificent victory 3.6″ ahead of Monteiro. Matveev finally made it into the top three more than three seconds behind, while Hélias took 4th position without having been able to attack his Russian rival. Lindblom completed the top five ahead of Nilsson and Turney, still solidly in the Championship lead. Iglesias had to make do with 13th place, Dupé finished 20th with a gain of 13 places, Tom Dussol (CRG/Iame) 23rd and Philippe Karras (LN/Iame) 25th.
Info Kartcom with Kartlink / Photo © KSP