EuroNASCAR champion Day: Ercoli will be “champion one day, no doubt about it”
Alon Day beat Gianmarco Ercoli in a heart-stopping final in the EuroNASCAR PRO title fight – The record-breaking champion sees the Italian winning the championship one day
“Today it was karma, in my opinion, but one day he’s going to be a champion, no doubt about it,” Alon Day tells ‘EuroNASCAR.com’ about the 2022 NASCAR Whelen Euro Series (NWES) title fight he won against Gianmarco Ercoli. In the final race of the season, a top-5 result was enough for the Israeli to clinch his record fourth title. Day stormed to third place and secured the championship win.
“I knew where I had to finish to win the title,” Day clarifies. “Gianmarco did an incredible race, I have to give him credit for that. He made it from fourth to first.” The race didn’t go entirely without controversy, however, as Ercoli shoved Day to the edge of the track on the first lap in the battle for second place, dropping Day to fifth as the Italian battled with Giorgio Maggi for first.
It was not the first contact between the two former teammates: The first incident occurred at Brands Hatch, where Day crashed into the rear of the CAAL Racing driver’s car. While Day received a penalty in the PK Carsport Chevrolet, Ercoli retired with damage to his vehicle. A similar situation occurred in Italy, but with the signs reversed. This time there were no retirements or accidents, although the contact was there, so Ercoli got off without a penalty.
Day is talking about karma because as the race progressed in the EuroNASCAR finale, Ercoli went off the track in the battle for first place with Maggi after contact with the Swiss and had to retire from the race. That incident decided the championship in favor of Day, but even without his competitor’s accident, he was on his way to winning the title with a fourth-place finish. Day is now not only the winningest driver in NWES history, but also the only driver with four titles under his belt.
Day got married in 2022, but due to the intensive preparation for the season finale, the honeymoon was canceled for the time being. The Israeli is now keen to make up for that during the winter break. “I promised her, because we got married six months ago and I kept telling her that I had to race,” says the 31-year-old. “That’s why there was no honeymoon. After that, I will think about my future.”
Should Day decide to defend his NWES title again, the season will start for the Ashdod-native racer on May 6 and 7 at Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Valencia, Spain. In the 23-year history of the NWES, there is no more successful driver than the Israeli, who could one day achieve cult status in the European NASCAR paddock similar to the seven-time US NASCAR champions Richard Petty, Dale Earnhardt and Jimmie Johnson, who are among the sport’s greatest legends in the United States.
