The 3rd round of the Champions of the Future promoted by RGMMC was an opportunity for all the most important teams of the OK and OK Junior classes to prepare for the next stage of the FIA European Championship OK and OK Junior, which will take place on the Swedish circuit on June 5th. It is precisely in this perspective that the work done by the CRG official team shall be interpreted, which came to this event with 5 drivers, including the rookie in the OK Junior category, Scott Lindblom. For the Swedish driver it was a return to the ranks of the CRG Team, after he had started his career in professional karting in Italy with the Mini category with the Italian squad. For him it was an apprenticeship competition, where he made some mistakes as it was easy to predict, but in which he also highlighted his great potential at times.
Talking again about the OK Junior, Nikolas Roos left the Kristianstad track with a mixed feeling: while on one hand he did an excellent job in free practice, always placing himself among the fastest, on the other he has complicated his weekend with some bad qualifying in which he was unable to finish a clean lap. Starting back, also because of the rain on Saturday, his race was compromised, ending in the Final with a retirement due to a race contact. In OK Gabriel Gomez made once again excellent performances and in the Final he lost the top ten, due to a penalty for the spoiler, but above all he has completed the work plan that the team has prepared for the European Championship. A more complicated weekend for Viktor Gustafsson who, due to some contacts in the heats on Saturday, where the alternation between wet and dry track made the qualifying races a real lottery, did not qualify for the Final. Adrián Malheiro was also unlucky: after some positive heats he was then excluded in the Final after a race contact.
The last appointment of the Champions of the Future, which will be the prologue to the last stage of the Euro OK and OK Junior, returns on the Franciacorta track in Italy on June 26th, while the direct drive categories will be back on the track in Kristianstad in two weeks for the 3rd round of the FIA European Championship.
CRG drivers’ post-race reaction:
Nikolas Roos (OKJ): “These races have the main function of preparing for the European Championship and from this point of view we have done an excellent job, both with a planned work program for the chassis and for the engine. We have always been among the fastest and in all track conditions. In terms of results we are obviously not happy and all the complications started from qualifying, where in just three laps I was unable to finish one of them without traffic. Starting back in the heats was even more difficult than expected, because the rain on Saturday made the races much less linear, but if we look at the pace we have had in the first heat on Friday on a dry track, where I got P3, we can say we have a good speed. Now my goal will be to realize these good performances with a result and I hope that the European Championship race here in Kristianstad will repay us for the work done so far”.
Gabriel Gomez (OK): “The variable weather affected a bit the work we had to do on this track in view of the European Championship and it was not therefore an easy weekend. The data we have been able to collect on the engine and chassis are positive and make us look to the race that will take place on this track in 15 days with optimism. As for the result, we had a good race pace, but to fight for the podium we need to take one more step on which the whole team is working with great commitment ”.
