The Pons Racing steamroller kept up its fine form on Saturday as Heikki Kovalainen converted poles into two dominant wins at the Lausitzring World Series by Nissan races.
In the morning race, the Finnish driver was completely untroubled by two safety-car periods, although he had to fight to keep his position off the line.
Enrique Bernoldi (GD Racing) made a menacing getaway from third, but Kovalainen made sure he couldn’t squeeze through. The block meant Tristan Gommedny (Saulnier Racing) nipped up Bernoldi’s inside, but the Frenchman ran wide, leaving Bernoldi to lead the chase.
The only times Bernoldi got close were when the safety car came out (once for Narain Karthikeyan’s spin and once when Didier Andre tangled with Pablo Donoso just after the first restart. But the order at the front did not change at any stage. The top three mostly had breathing space between them, but Tiago Monteiro (Carlin Motorsport) had strong pressure from Jean-Cristophe Ravier in the Epsilon Euskadi car, after the Portuguese driver had a poor getaway.
Monteiro held on to his place, with Spaniard Felix Porteiro completing a steady drive to sixth place, ahead of Kovalainen’s team-mate Adrian Valles.
Kovalainen had to keep himself entertained with a succession of fastest laps as he again had no trouble in squashing the field in the second race. The Pons Racing driver was no doubt aware that there were competitors somewhere far behind him, but he barely had to give them a thought once he had dived into the first corner in the lead.
A struggling Monteiro helped Heikki’s cause by holding up much of the field as he lay second (after a better start) in the early going. That meant that Kovalainen was ten seconds up by the time he needed to make his pitstop.
Monteiro was always going to lose places during the tyre changes, but did well to only get passed by Jean-Cristophe Ravier, who proceeded to run away into second position. That left Monteiro to fend off Enrique Bernoldi and Felix Porteiro in the second half of the race. The pressure finally told two laps from the end when the Portuguese driver let them both through with a trip onto the grass on the infield.
He returned to the track to claim fifth, ahead of Narain Karthikeyan, Juan Cruz Alvarez and Pablo Donoso. Kovalainen has now stretched his championship lead to 36 points and looks like the clear title favourite at the series heads to the next round at Estoril in September.
In the World Series Light events, it was again a question of one fairly uneventful race and one completely crazy one.
Miguez led away from pole position and dominated the opening race. Equally untroubled in second was Milos Pavlovic, although he had to get past Simon Abadie who overtook him at the start. Abadie was then hunted down by his Epsilon Sport team-mate Bastien Briere, who took the last podium spot.
But the Spanish driver lost his chance of a double after a terrible start in the second race. Or so it seemed. Miguez’s near-stall allowed Pavlovic into the lead, from where he romped away to a nine-second lead. But then the Yugoslavian had to pull off with problems, before Lahaye retired and both Epsilon entries ran into trouble. That left the race as a fierce battle between Matteo Pellegrino and the recovering Miguez! But Pellegrino made no mistake and held on for an exciting win.
RACE 1 WORLD SERIES BY NISSAN
H.KOVALAINEN 29'25.198 E.BERNOLDI 2.495 T.GOMMENDY 4.332 T.MONTEIRO 5.778 J.RAVIER 6.188 F.PORTEIRO 7.783 A.VALLES 9.799 O.PLA 12.060 J.VIDOT 12.965 N.KARTHIKEYAN 14.604 G.RICCI 15.879 S.HERNANDEZ 16.407 R.RODRIGUEZ 22.291 T.TSUBOBAYASHI 25.019 G.TEDESCHI 30.624Not Classified
D.ANDRE 7 laps
P.DONOSO 9 laps
J.ALVAREZ 14 laps
T.KOSTKA 14 laps
Fastest Lap: H.KOVALAINEN 1’32.215
RACE 2 WORLD SERIES BY NISSAN
H.KOVALAINEN 1'32.798 21 175.9 J.RAVIER 13.726 E.BERNOLDI 25.000 F.PORTEIRO 26.196 T.MONTEIRO 28.352 N.KARTHIKEYAN 28.924 J.ALVAREZ 32.673 T.GOMMENDY 34.898 P.DONOSO 42.597 S.HERNANDEZ 44.657 A.VALLES 45.693 G.RICCI 56.900 J.VIDOT 1'04.235 T.TSUBOBAYAS 1'14.162 T.KOSTKA 1'30.487 G.TEDESCHI 1 lap O.PLA 3 lapsNot starting
R.RODRIGUEZ
Fastes Lap: H.KOVALAINEN 1.32.798
RACE 1 WORLD SERIES LIGHT
1. C. Miguez 26’20.890
2. M.Pavlovic 8.512
3. B.Briere 11.005
4. S.Abadie 11.075
5. M.Pellegrino 18.220
6. H.Pimat 18.987
7. M.Lahaye 50.154
RACE 2 WORLD SERIES LIGHT
M.Pellegrino 26.34.387 C. Miguez 0.567 H.Pimat 3.018 B.Briere 1 lap
Not Classified
S.Abadie 3 laps
M.Lahaye 7 laps
M.Pavlovic 9 laps
GENERAL DRIVERS CLASIFICATION WORLD SERIES BY NISSAN
KOVALAINEN H. 126 points
BERNOLDI E. 90 points
MONTEIRO T. 78 points
RAVIER J. 69 points
GOMMENDY T. 61 points
KARTHIKEYAN N. 53 points
ALVAREZ J. 40 points
PORTEIRO F. 35 points
PLA O. 29 points
JOUANNY B. 25 points
VILARIÑO A. 24 points
FUKUDA R. 18 points
VALLES A. 14 points
ANDRE D. 9 points
DONOSO P. 3 points
VIDOT J. 2 points
RODRIGUEZ R. 2 points
HERNANDEZ S. 1 points
KOSTKA T. 1 points
GENERAL TEAMS CLASIFICATION WORLD SERIES BY NISSAN
PONS RACING 140 points
CARLIN MOTORSPORT 97 points
EPSILON EUSKADI 95 points
GD RACING 93 points
RC MOTORSPORT 64 points
SAULNIER RACING 62 points
GABORD REYCO 40 points
PORFESA COMPETICION 37 points
KTR 34 points
PAUL BELMONDO RACING 18 points
GENERAL DRIVERS CLASIFICATIONS WORLD SERIES LIGHT
PAVLOVIC M. 112 points
MIGUEZ C. 84 points
PELLEGRINO M. 81 points
ABADIE S. 76 points
BRIERE B. 74 points
LAHAYE M. 57 points
PRIMAT H. 49 points
TEDESCHI G. 29 points
DEL PINO J. 26 points
CENCETTI M. 10 points
GENERAL TEAMS CLASIFICATIONS WORLD SERIES LIGHT
VERGANI FORMULA 234 points
EPSILON SPORT 167 points
SAULNIER RACING 122 points
MEYCOM SPORT 91 points
RC MOTORSPORT 36 poin
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