Last Updated on 22 September, 2024 by FKC
On our birthday weekend the weather was nice. We were able to use the whole track at MAGP. The fastest in Qualification was Berke who got his first TQ in career. Right behind him was Mattias, followed by Tommie and Igor.
In the Semi-Final Berke held his leading position on the start and even during the first lap. Mattias was pressing Berke. Tommie was pressing Mattias and Igor was pressing Tommie. Mattias made a tiny mistake on the last left-hander of the 3rd lap and Tommie used this opportunity very well for an overtake. That gave Berke a little time to make a room behind himself. But not for long. Tommie gained on him fast and started pressing. Mattias meanwhile wanted his spot back and searched for the gap. Igor let them all go and just couldn’t keep their pace. Finally Mattias forced Tommie to go a bit wide in the 2nd to last corner, went side-by-side and finished his move by the end of the start-finish straight. This battle played pretty well for Berke who again had a gap behind himself by a few laps to the finish. It vanished quickly and Berke felt another pressure from behind. Any wrong breath could compromise his race. But then was the checkered flag and he could breathe normally again 🙂. In the middle of the peloton Jimmy passed Leo, but the gap to top 4 was way too large to gain. By the way, the top 3 finished within 0,6 seconds!
The Final started quite calmly with Berke holding his lead and closing any opportunity for Mattias to overtake. Tommie meanwhile searched for the way to pass Mattias, while Igor was just trying to stay within close range from the top 3 just in case. And this “case” happened when Tommie attempted the attack on Mattias and almost spun him. Tommie, being a very polite driver, wanted to let Mattias get back to P2 in order to avoid a penalty. But he didn’t realize that Igor was very close behind and he didn’t want to stop and let them settle their thing. Instead Igor used this opportunity to overtake them both. “Thank you very much”, he said and moved up to P2. Because all 3 of them slowed down drastically, that created a huge gap to Berke who could relax and enjoy his lead.
Igor, having a bit slower pace than two karts behind him, was constantly under attacks from Mattias. But the Latvian didn’t make any mistakes and closed all the doors. That holded Mattias a bit and gave a chance to Tommie to finally get Mattias and move up one place. After this part was done, he reached Igor and already wanted to fight with him. But suddenly the rain started to fall down! Karts started to slide outside and inside. Everybody slowed down, because only 1,5 laps left to go and nobody wanted to make a mistake. On the last lap it was already a shower! Lap times increased from 44 seconds to 1 minute. It was already very wet. The risk of spin was huge. Berke prayed that Igor wouldn’t catch him. Igor prayed not to spin. Tommie didn’t think of anything and slided a bit wide in the corner letting Mattias back through. Here’s a checkered flag and Berke wins his career’s first race. Igor is 2nd and Mattias 3rd. Tommie finished 4th and wasn’t happy about that.
But the happiest person was Berke! He deserved this win. In the season standings Igor is still leading overall, but Mattias already 4 points ahead of him in the (-4 races) section. Our big thanks goes to Mattias Andersson at MAGP and to all participants! But this racing day wasn’t over yet…
Race documentation you may find here.