Tony Kart continues the OK-OKJ european championship with a podium in Portugal
The second round of the championship, held at the Kartódromo Internacional do Algarve in Portimão, ended with a third place in OKJ for the Racer 401 T, gained by our official driver Ilie Tristan Crisan.
At the end of a weekend featured by rain, but with finals held on dry asphalt, the Tony Kart Racing Team leaves its mark in the second round of the FIA Karting European Championship OK-OKJ. At the Kartódromo Internacional do Algarve in Portimão (Portugal), our Tony Kart Racer 401 T gains the podium in the OKJ category, powered by the Vortex VTJ engine, and takes to the track in OK, powered by the VTS engine of the OTK Kart Group’s "engine division".
In OKJ category, despite the extremely variable weather between Friday and Sunday, Ilie Tristan Crisan is constantly at the top of the standings. The Canadian driver, in fact, starts the qualifyings with the best time in his group and conquers three top-3 in the following qualifying heats. Despite a difficult super heat A on Sunday morning, Crisan is at the starting grid of the final as one of the main protagonists: at the start he is able to avoid any kind of contact and, in just two laps, gains six positions. Subsequently, our standard-bearer enters the tussle for fourth place and, moreover, records the second best chrono time of the race. In the final lap, with a clever operation on the outside, our standard-bearer strongly takes the final third position.
Also author of a third place in the qualifying heats, Nikita Ljubimov starts from a good position in the final, but is unfortunately involved in an accident during the second lap. Both with a fifth place as their best result in the qualifying heats, Mateo Rivals and Sebastian Eskandari-Marandi move up the standings by eight and six positions respectively during the last race scheduled for the Portuguese event. Julian Frasnelli, Oliveri Sini and Henri-Constant Kumpen continue their training among the "Juniors".
In OK, Jindřich Pešl leads our team of drivers with a fifth place as his best placement in the qualifying heats and the fastest lap of heat D-E, while in the final he recovers a total of eight positions in the standings. For the second time, Gino Rocchio enters the final race on Sunday afternoon, in his second appearance in the European championship Oliver Rasmussen and Thomas Pradier have a difficult weekend, but they’re already looking forward to the next engagements on the calendar.
The Tony Kart Racing Team will be back on track in Valencia, Spain, in a few days, for the first round of the Champions of the Future Shifters (May 7th – 10th), reserved for the KZ and KZ2 categories.
