Balestri & Coelho take opening ENS qualifier

Dario Balestri and Bruno Coelho have claimed the first round of qualifying at the Euro Nitro Series season opener in Italy.  The reigning 1:8 Champion, Balestri topped the times from Robert Pietsch while in 1:10 Coelho was fastest over the 4-minutes from the touring car class’ reigning champion Jilles Groskamp.  Having started out the day with their drivers topping the times in both classes, Serpent wouldn’t be able to maintain their position, driver errors the prblem for Merlin Depta in 1:8 and both Alessio Mazzeo & Dominic Greiner in the 1:10 encounter.  Mark Green would at least see Serpent in the Top 3 of 1:10 while in 1:8, World Champion Simon Kurzbuch was third fastest.

A massive, by L.Collari RC Raceway standards, 2.1-seconds faster than his closest rival, Balestri was clearly happy with his performance and in particular pleased that his only complaint was his Capricorn LAB-CO8 RS version ‘had a lot steering’.  With understeer the common complaint in the pits in Bologna, last year’s Top Qualifier said his car ‘felt really good for the conditions’.  Posting the fastest lap of Q1, with a 15.286 second lap, for the second of the four qualifiers the Italian ‘might run a bit less camber’ to reduce his steering.

Only 11th fastest in practice, Pietsch was happy to get ‘good points for the first round’ admitting he has been ‘struggling a bit with set-up’.  ‘Not so happy with (the) car at the moment’, the former World Champion thinks he ‘maybe (has a) problem with (his) steering servo’.  Having been unable to get the car to his liking the German will fit a new servo for Q2.

Setting the inital TQ pace, Kurzbuch said ‘it was a good start to quali’ adding ‘I have points now to attack for TQ’.  Describing his Novarossi powered Shepherd V8 as ‘at the beginning very good’ the Swiss driver continued ‘it then started to push on the fast corners and I lost a little pace’.  To try and cure this he will adjust the front down stops and caster.

Behind Kurzbuch, BP Racing’s Mirko Salemi, who is running in the second fastest heat, put in an impressive run to post the fourth fastest time. Behind him, fellow Italian Carmine Raiola would be the quickest Infinity driver with a P5 run with new Capricorn signing Robin D’hondt completing the Top 6.  Unfortunately for 2016 race winner Lamberto Collari he wouldn’t complete the first qualifying, his Infinity coming to a stop just half way through the heat.  Having topped practice, Depta would run into the back of another car but said the biggest loss of time came from pacing himself off the car ahead thinking it was quick when it wasn’t.

Winner of the season opener last year, Coelho summed up his Q1 performance as ‘very good’ adding he had ‘no mistakes’.  Improvng his Xray NT1 from practice he said it was still ‘not perfect’ and he would ‘keep working on it to find more steering’.  Getting the opportunity to follow Groskamp on track he said compared to his rival he felt he had the same level of steering, understeer an issue for all drivers today, but he is having to drive more aggressively than the Dutchman adding ‘thats not good for a final, I can’t drive 45-minute like this’.

Groskamp felt he ‘improved (his) car a little bit’ adding his Maxima engine was also better after a pipe change for Q1.  The Infinity driver who is racing a Capricorn in 1:10 this weekend, said the car was not the fastest over a lap but it was a good for a 4-minute run.  In addition to trying to find more steering for Q2, the former Electric Touring Car World Champion will also adjust his second gear to change later.

‘Was Ok’ was Green’s response after Q1, the British driver reporting being held up at the beginning. He continued ‘for the first run the drivers went a bit mad’ so I just tried to be careful’.  ‘A safe clean run’ he added, ‘My fastest lap didn’t come until my second last lap so there is definitely more to come’.  After leading a Serpent 1, 2, 3 in practice, Mazzeo made a mistake that saw his 748 go off track resulting a chunked tyre.  Greiner also made a mistake that intially lead to a body tuck on his warm-up lap that then resulted in a faster car collecting his Serpent causing him to start the heat late.

Behind the Top 3, Erik Dankel was again fourth fastest as he was in practice. Behind the former Champion, Dirk Wischnewski and David Loppini completed the Top 6.

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