Martin tops practice at Arena33
Lee Martin has topped 2WD for Round 4 of the Euro Offroad Series at Arena33 in Germany. The Yokomo driver topped the times in both rounds of timed practice to top the seeding from Bruno Coelho and Joona Haatanen. For championship leader Michal Orlwoski, one of the EOS’ most challenging tracks to date left the Schumacher driver 9th quickest. The Polish driver and winner of the previous two EOS encounters said he ‘just struggled with some mistakes and traffic’ but added ‘I think I am on the pace and I’m not slower that Lee & Bruno’.
Winner of the EOS Warm-up race last weekend, Martin said ‘the track is completely different, there are no corners anymore’. Describing the new layout as ‘not bad’ he added ‘it doesn’t flow properly and the step down is still a bit meh’. Running new plastic rear hubs that allow for more adjustments and which will feature on the next kit release, he said in terms of set-up he was ‘not going to change anything yet’ but add ‘we’ll see after 5-minutes, the 3-laps only shows we are in the right area’. Martin’s team-mate Marc Rheinard would take his example of the YZ-2 to the sixth fastest time.
‘The car is working well just the track is very difficult’ is how Coelho summed up his practice. Having claimed his first 2WD podium of the season last time out, in the class he openly admits is his weakest, the Xray driver added the track ‘is all about the driver and not the car’. He concluded, ‘I really like the layout, it’s challenging. The pace is there but its all about the driving so lets see how the first qualifying goes’.
Just 1/10th of a second off Coelho over his best three laps, Haatanen was pleased with his pace. Removing his B6 swaybar after free practice and changing to a heavier shock oil, the Finn said this left the car easier to drive. Describing the track as ‘different’, the youngster said with ‘lots of jumps’ it is ‘fun’ to drive. While making a couple of mistakes in each of the practice runs he said by being ‘a bit more focused’ for qualifying he should also be able to convert his pace into a good 5-minute time. Team-mate Neil Cragg didn’t have such a good practice and only 12th fastest he will line-up on the second fastest heat on a track where traffic can be very costly. The European Champion said his standard set-up for the B6 didn’t give him the car he expected with his runs also hampered by a lack of brakes he hopes to rectify by changing his speedo settings. In terms of the car, for Q1 the British driver will copy Haatanen’s set-up.
Posting the 4th fastest time, Martin Bayer summed up his morning at Arena33 as ‘pretty OK’. The Slovakian based Czech driver said, ‘going from my home track (Hudy Arena) which is 2 times the size is a big difference but the layout is fun’. Running an unchanged XB2 from the last EOS which was held at the Hudy Arena, the Xray Offroad team-manager continued, ‘the more I drive here the more I enjoy it and with the car feeling really good I can just drive around and try to make no mistakes’.
Having missed the last two EOS encounters due to military service, Norway’s Joakim Nicolaisen made a strong return to post the 5th quickest time of practice. The Team Associated driver said ‘practice went really well, I’m surprised by my pace here because before my break I was not so competitive’. Having done a lot of testing in preparation for the event, the 20-year-old said his car is ‘really good’ after he switched to a different swaybar which ‘calmed it down and didn’t lose too much steering’. On the track he said ‘it has a nice flow but at the same time it is hard to get the timing right for some of the jumps’ adding ‘there will be a lot of crashes for sure in qualifying’.
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