Pietsch fastest in practice at title decider

Robert Pietsch was fastest in practice at the title deciding season finale of the Euro Nitro Series, the Mugen driver topping the 1:8 times from team-mate Rick Vrielijnck and championship rival Simon Kurzbuch.  Over 3-consecutive laps of the Fiorano track, the German was 4/10th faster than Vrielijnck with Kurzbuch a further 1/10th off with his Shepherd.

Pleased with his pace, ENS Round 3 race winner Pietsch said he hasn’t had to do much to his MRX-5 having travelled to the famous Italian track two weeks ago for testing.  With some drivers having issues with the high grip created by the 1:5 event held here last weekend, Pietsch said he got lucky with the timing of his test as just days before there had also been a large scale race held.  The former World Champion said the grip this time round was different however because of the oil from the 150 plus nitro cars running this weekend and mixing with the rubber laid down by the 1:5 cars but still his car was working well. Skipping the last practice due to the heavily loaded practice groups making for a very busy track, he said he is well prepared now for qualifying, 1:8 running the first of their 5 qualifier this evening.  In terms of his car the Mugen designer is running new lower rear arms and a new rod assembly that replaces the original rear upper arm with both parts set to feature on the next generation 1:8 Mugen kit release.

Racing at the track for the first time in 3-years, Vrielijnck said practice had gone ‘pretty well’ with his big focus being on finding two set-ups for his MRX-5, one for the morning and one for the evening.  The car being good in the morning he said in the evening the track feels more greasy adding that possibly some of the changes needed for those conditions might need to come from the driver.  Calling the practice runs ‘busy’, for Q1 he will go for the best set-up he has ran and with a clearer track he will see how that works out over 4-minutes.  In the engine department, the Dutch driver said he was really happy with how his Picco engine felt.

Championship points leader Kurzbuch said his Novarossi powered Velox V8 was better in the morning.  Changing shock oil for the first controlled practice,  the Swiss driver said it made little difference so he reverted back to what he started out with but in the second practice the car was ‘not so good’, his Top 3 seeding time coming from CP1.  Unsure as to why the car lost pace he said he is going over everything on it to check all is correct adding if he can get the car back to where it was in free practice he should be good for Q1.

Winner of the Novarossi Trophy race here last month, Lamberto Collari set the fourth fastest time.  Running a standard Mugen MRX-5, the 1:8 legend said his biggest concentration in controlled practice was adjusting his car to suit the handout Hot Race tyres.  Describing the track as having a lot more grip than at the Novarossi Trophy, he said the tyres given out in the controlled zone are slightly softer.  Making some fine adjustment for this he is confident they will be good for Q1.

Fifth fastest was Shepherd driver Andrea Lorenzi.  The 21-year-old said he is lacking consistency but the speed is there.  Feeling he is improving his OS Speed powered Velox V8 with each run for the first qualifier he will take a risk with changing bodyshell.  Having run Protoform’s R18, the Italian will switch to a local made Zytech Ginetta body which he said should give him better off power steering allowing him to improve on his consistency.

Completing the Top 6 was Oliver Mack was ‘not so happy’.  The Shepherd driver said his car feels fast to drive but when he looks at the time sheets that feeling is not reflected and he doesn’t know why.  Admitting the power of his Sonic engine was a little lacking he will change to a different one for Q1 but said the biggest problem is that his Velox V8 is a bit too easy to drive.  Set to make a rear end set-up change the German said he hoped that would make things better for qualifying.  Behind Mack, BP Racing’s Mirko Salemi set the 7th fastest time followed by Round 2 race winner John Ermen and BMT’s Daniele Ielasi with European Junior Champion Noah Asendorf rounding out the Top 10.

View our event image gallery here.