SKUBA DREAM TAKES THE THIRD BALTIC ENDURANCE CHAMPIONSHIP VICTORY THIS SEASON
With Skuba Dream team victory ended the 4th event of Baltic 4h Endurance Championship in Riga, Bikernieki racetrack. It was already the 3rd event victory for Lithuanian team this season – they managed to increase the season lead even more over the other teams.
Qualifying
The best time in qualification set Rotoma Racing with BMW M3 and Robertas Kupčikas behind the wheel taking the pole position. Second was Skuba Dream while Est 1 Racing team took the 3rd starting position.
The beginning of the qualifying session was not that successful for our guest participant team “KSB Racing” from Finland with Chevrolet Camaro. Their car broke down at the beginning of the session and the team had to manage to prepare it for the race itself.
The leading team “Nero-GSR Racing” did not show up in qualifying, too. As the team member Eernesta Globytė told before the race, they saw a leak from gear box cooling system, so decided rather to fix a car for the race and skipped the qualifying. One more team from Lithuania called “Galingas.lt” had a serious engine problem and did not show up neither for qualifying or race itself.
Race
The BEC 4H race was really interesting and full of battles until the finish line. All the best three teams that manage to show the best time during the qualifying kept fighting for the best position on the podium. It was quite a race for our new team from Finland “LMS Racing” and their “Seat Leon TCR” car – due to the crash they had to leave the battle after 52 minutes of racing.
After 1 hour 22 minutes from the beginning of the race there was an incident between “Flash Racing Latvia” BMW driven by Konstantin Calko and “Nero-GSR Racing Team” Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR car driven by Nerijus Malaševičius. It seams that Calko did not see the car coming as it was on a “blind side” of the viewing zone and he did not let N.Malaševičius to pass – that caused an accident and “Nero-GSR Racing team” had to leave the race. Quite unsuccessful race it was for “Cone Forest Motorsport“ team, too: their car crashed to the fence and did not leave any option for the team to fight for the podium.
After a strong fight until the final second of the race, finally victory belonged to “Skuba Dream” team with Egidijus Valeiša and Jonas Gelžinis behind the wheel. Their “Porsche” left “Rotoma Racing” teams’ BMW M3 and drivers Robertas Graudinis, Gintaras Morkevičius and Robertas Kupčikas in the second place – only 5,37 seconds behind. Third place in overall won “EST 1 Racing” team from Estonia participating with “Porsche Cayman GT4” and Thomas Padovani, Sten Pentus, Raimo Kulli and Jukka Honkavuori behind its‘ wheel. The same TOP 3 looks like in a „GT” class, too.
4th postion before the end of the race was holding Flash Racing team but shortly before the end of the race they experienced problems with fuel system and stopped at the side of the track. After getting back to boxes team continued the race and finished 9th overall.
So, at the end of 4 hours incredible race, “A2000“ class winner was “RM klubas“ team from Lithuania racing with black Honda Civic and 2nd place winner was “Bruno Racing Team“ from Latvia.
“A3000“ class victory belonged to “Greičio Akademija II“ and second place to their friends team “Greičio Akademija I“. “A3000+“ class winner of this event was “IGORIOLANKAI“ team and their incredible “Seat Leon TCR“ car, 2nd place winner – “LiquiMoly Racing Team LT“ with BMW and the third place was won by “222“ team with “VW Scirocco“.
Among diesel fuel using cars classes, the victory in “D1” was celebrated by one more team from Lithuania “Telšių statybai“, as the second place winners was “Sparti reklama – PF Kekava“ team. Both teams race with 1st class BMW cars. “D2“ class was won by “PGM technika racing“ team and once again BMW, as the second place was taken by “Flash Racing Latvija“ team.
