After penalty chaos: Day and Naska win Sunday’s races
Alon Day and Alberto Naska won Sunday’s races at the NWES opener in Valencia – Both decisions were made at the green table
The NASCAR Whelen Euro Series (NWES) visited the Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Valencia, Spain, on May 14 and 15. After two exciting rounds on Sunday, both the EuroNASCAR PRO and EuroNASCAR 2 drivers were back in action on Sunday. However, race control got into the focus.
It was Vladimiros Tziortzis who was initially delighted with his second win of the season in the second EuroNASCAR league and thus a perfect weekend at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Valencia, Spain.
But then everything turned out differently: infringements were detected on Tziortzis’ vehicle by the race stewards, resulting in a ten-place penalty for the supposed race winner. As a result, the previous day’s winner slipped back to eleventh place.
The winner was rookie and YouTube star Alberto Naska in the service of CAAL Racing. Tziortzis had words of praise for his opponent: “Congratulations to him, I’m really impressed. He’s a rookie, so I think he’s going to get faster and faster. It’s going to be a hot battle until the end,” he comments on the Italian’s performance on his debut.
Due to Tziortzis’ demotion, Martin Doubek finished second in his Ford Mustang, while his teammate Liam Hezemans, who is the younger brother of two-time EuroNASCAR PRO champion Loris Hezemans, showed his potential in just his second official NASCAR race, bringing home third place.
He was followed in fourth and fifth by Frenchman Ulysse Delsaux and Gil Linster, who thus both posted solid results throughout the weekend. With his overall win, Naska also secured victory ahead of Hezemans and Paul Jouffreau in the Rookie Trophy.
As on the previous day, Melvin De Groot decided the Legend Trophy in his favor, relegating the two Marko-Stipp Motorsport drivers Yevgen Sokolovskiy and Miguel Gomes to second and third places. Fastest lady on Sunday was CAAL Racing driver Luli De Castello ahead of Alina Loibnegger. The podium was completed by the experienced Arianna Casoli.
Long wait for results
The protagonists of the second race of the season in the EuroNASCAR PRO division were the veterans Alon Day and Gianmarco Ercoli. Polesitter Ercoli initially took the lead but was chased by Day. After a late caution period, Day slipped past Ercoli to cross the finish line first. Ercoli’s teammate and previous day’s winner Nicolo Rocca finished third.
For a long time it was unclear whether this finish was the final result, because initially there was a five-second time penalty for Ercoli for disregarding the track limits. But Day was also originally to be given a ten-second time penalty for a mistake on the restart.
So Rocca would have been the winner and the Marko Stipp Motorsport team would have been able to celebrate the first podium finish in the team’s history after their driver Romain Iannetta had been flushed to the back of the field shortly before the end of the race due to a technical defect.
The joy was short-lived, however, because after examining further evidence, the penalties against Day and Ercoli were rescinded by the race control and marshals. Thus, the finish was identical to the final result: Day won ahead of Ercoli and Rocca. Fourth place thus went to Iannetta and Alexander Graff completed the top five.
With an eighth place overall, Tobias Dauenhauer secured victory in the Junior Trophy ahead of Gustas Grinbergas and Racers Motorsport driver Leonardo Colavita. Massimiliano Lanza decided the Challenger Trophy in his favor, followed by Martin Doubek in second place and Henri Tuomaala for Team Bleekemolen in third.
The next NWES event will be held on June 11 and 12 at the tradition-steeped circuit at Brands Hatch in the UK.
