After a fertile year for the entire Spork Racing Team, the last races of the Supercar Challenge were held during the Final Races Assen last weekend. The duo Adriaenssens-Nye crowned itself vice-champion in the Supercopa division earlier, but was still keen on shining in the Supersport division. As usual, the second Supercopa n° 325 was driven by the duo De Kimpe – Van Paemel.
“The qualifying session was one never to forget, it was stopped twice for an oil trail and for a huge crash. The Seat Leon Supercopa of Remco De Beus went off in the ‘Ramshoek’-corner and rolled four times to eventually land on its roof. Eventually the paddock filled itself with joy again, after having noted that Remco only suffered a concussion and some bruised ribs from this horror-crash! Luckily David could easily forget the accident and lapped a toptime, which gave us P3 in the Supercopa division.” Jimmy Adriaenssens.
David Nye started the first race and launched himself until he got hit hard by a slightly too optimistic competitor. “While exiting the second corner the car next to me threw itself on the ideal line, not noticing I was already driving there. His car hit mine pretty hard and we both went off. Once I rejoined the track I felt vibrations whilst braking, they were caused by a damaged bearing. If I’d go to the pits, I’d lose that much time that the race would be over so we decided over the radio that I’d keep driving and noticing the bearing problem. If it didn’t get worse I could easily fulfill the race.” Due to that avoidable collision, the Supercopa of the English-Belgian duo lost time but regained it slowly. After about thirty minutes of racing, it was up to Jimmy Adriaenssens. He rejoined the track in a fourth position, with about a twelve second gap on the other Super’SPORK’copa. “After a few laps, the Petronas-car appeared in front of me and I closed the gap with Vincent Van Paemel. What followed was a titanic struggle which was clearly tasted by the crowd. Several attacks followed one to another but it became obvious that pushing these attacks would lead to contact and contact with my teammate was the last thing I wanted. The pace got higher and higher and we started equaling our qualifying times. I also knew that Jonas and Vincent needed their points while my vice-title had already been ensured in Spa, so I wasn’t going to rush an overtake. As I followed Vincent I saw he had really done his homework right. He rarely made mistakes, which made overtaking harder and harder. Watching Vincent race like that was a clear confirmation that the Spork Racing Team is a nursery for young talent. For this once we had to agree on finishing fourth.” still a satisfied Jimmy Adriaenssens.
The start of the second race was up to AJ. He got away pretty easy and won three positions in the first straight. He immediately seized the third place amongst the Supercopas, but what followed was outright horror. “I saw a Lotus approaching in my mirror and I created an opening for him to pass. As a thank you, the car launched itself, just like in the first race, onto my right front wheel. My suspension was smashed and the race was over. After having examined the video footage it was obvious I didn’t have any blame in the collision. I went aside as far as I could and the other car still made contact. It was obvious the other car throttled way to soon and slided into mine. Ok, this is racing, but if I see one car making the same mistake twice, I start asking myself questions…” an seriously indignant Jimmy Adriaenssens.
Despite these crashes in the last weekend, it has been a very sportive and beautiful racing season with a lot of podiums, good atmosphere and a vice-title for the duo Adriaenssens-Nye. Also the Supercopa of De Kimpe – Van Paemel proved to be strong and could concur the third place in the Supercopa division. The knowledge and passion of the Spork Racing Team have clearly been confirmed and team manager Herman likes to thank all his driver and team members for the great cooperation.
See enclosed PDF-file for the Dutch race review.