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TTXGP Euro Championship Opener

19th May 2012

It certainly has been another eventful day with a practice session in the morning and a qualifier session in the afternoon. Teams looked eagerly towards the clouds moments before they kicked of the day with the first practice session

The rain had only started to fall, but was still changeable, so teams waited until the final moments before making their tyre choice. All teams with the exception of Zongshen ran with dry slicks, Zongshen being the only ones who opted for wet tyres.

The undisputed TTXGP world champions, Muench Racing, produced the fasted lap times of the session. We had a chance to catch up with the defending champ after the first practice.

“It nice to be here in Sweden, the track isn’t slow and safe one but I like, well I like every track. Our first practice went beautifully. We changed the setting on the suspension and it was perfect first time. From the first turn, I saw the Chinese guy, HoiChi Fung, and he was very quick, he overtook me on my first lap. I must say, he is a very good rider, but overall, we produced the fasted lap times. I managed to follow him, which was quite surprising as we do have a heavier bike. I can keep up with him in the corners but I know that I was much faster in the straights. I now feel that I know his riding style. My aim for tomorrow race is to consistently set lap times of under 50seconds, and thanks to my wonderful mechanics, I strongly feel that this is a possibility.”

However, it seemed Zongshen rider, HoiChi Fung stole the show by surprising spectators with the lap times, only 1.381 seconds of the German champ’s fastest time. It seemed the Chinese team had made the right tyre choice for their rider.

“I found that the track was very easy to learn. I haven’t had a chance to get any real practice session in before the season so on my free practice session I decided to push the bike to its limit. Unfortunately, I pushed too hard and ended up sliding the bike as I entered a corner. For some time I thought that I was pulling away for the Germans, but it turned out that they were just too quick and managed to close the gap.”

Stefan Bernstrom from Team Fiver couldn’t wait to burn some rubber on the track. Only recently being introduced to electric vehicles, Stefan rushed to be the first to exit the pits and open the throttle towards the first corner. Frustratingly for him, he returned after the first lap with a minor technical fault. Team Fiver rushed him into the pits to only have him on his way within minutes. Unfortunately for him, luck didn’t seem to be on his side today as the bike had to be nursed back into the pits on the 5^th lap after a motor failure.

Fighter jet pilot Peter Linden, racing for Linden Racing and Tang Yu, riding for Zongshen, managed to set fairly consistent lap times.

Qualifying Results

Pos	Team	Rider	No.	Best Time	Diff	Laps
1	Muench Racing	Matthias Himmelman	49	49.822		18
2	Zongshen	HoiChi Fung	59	50.917	1.095	7
3	Zongshen	Tang Yu	26	53.837	4.015	22
4	Linden Racing	Peter Linden	53			17
5	Team Fiver	Stefan Bernstrom	5			2