The starting grid of the OK Final of the European Championship in Trinec contained all the ingredients for an exciting race. Gabriel Gomez (CRG/Iame) shared the front row with Rene Lammers (Parolin/TM), Tomass Stolcermanis (Energy/TM) and Nathan Tye (Sodi/TM) followed on the second row ahead of Alex Powell (KR/Iame) and Mark Dubnitski (CRG/TM). It was difficult to imagine this time that Joe Turney (KR/Iame) could achieve the feat of coming back to the lead from his 22nd position at the start. Arthur Poulain (Tony Kart/Vortex) started 18th and Jimmy Hélias (CRG/Iame) 33rd. The sun was still shining but the storm clouds were moving very quickly around the track. The weather was therefore also uncertain. 25 laps were scheduled.
Gomez started in the lead, challenged from the first corner by Stolcermanis. Lammers was 3rd ahead of Powell and Ean Eyckmans (Tony Kart/Vortex). Tye had dropped back to 7th. Turney had already regained 10 positions! Sebastiano Pavan (Tony Kart/Vortex) was 5th. Kean Nakamura-Berta (KR/Iame) had moved up seven places to 7th. Fionn Mc Laughlin (KR/Iame) was 8th ahead of Matheus Morgatto (Birel ART/TM). Powell took 3rd from Lammers on lap 7. Leader Gomez had a 1,1″ advantage on Stolcermanis and continued to get away. Poulain had lost a lot of ground at the beginning of the race, whereas Hélias was back in 24th position (+9 pl).
At mid-race, Powell attacked Stolcermanis for 2nd position, 2,3” behind Gomez. Lammers gave his all to reach 3rd place a few tenths ahead of him. He succeeded in braking from a distance to make the inside of Stolcermanis on lap 18. Nakamura-Berta overtook Eyckmans shortly afterwards and Pavan attacked Stolcermanis. Nakamura-Berta got the better of Stolcermanis on the penultimate lap. Gomez finally won after a perfect run 1,5″ ahead of Powell who was then penalised in 4th position due to a spoiler penalty. Lammers took 2nd place ahead of Pavan and Eyckmans 5th. McLaughlin was 6th, Nakamura-Berta 7th with a spoiler penalty Dubnitski 8th ahead of Costa and Wisniewski. Lacking speed, Tye finished 11th ahead of Morgatto (spoiler), Stolcermanis 14th and Turney 15th (spoiler). Poulain crossed the line in 23rd position and was 25th (spoiler) and Hélias was 28th.
Info Kartcom with Kartlink / Photo © KSP