Suzuki: Fehr wins with luck and skill
SLALOM BURE Sandro Fehr won a round of the Suzuki Grand Prix for the first time this season with a lot of skill and a bit of luck. However, Fabian Eggenberger was only beaten by fractions of a second in the slalom in Bure. With his clear best time in training on the 5255 m long track in Bure, Sandro Fehr made all his Suzuki colleagues [...]
Sandro Fehr made it clear to all his Suzuki colleagues in the L2-1600 class that he wanted to return to the podium with his clear best time in training on the 5255 m long track in Bure. But the first race seemed to go completely wrong...
Sandro Fehr: "To avoid a major collision, I decided to skip a gate. I also got a time penalty for touching a cone. Shortly before the finish, I could hardly believe it - Gilbert Denzer hit the car in front of him and helped me to repeat the run."
Successful repeat run
The man from eastern Switzerland accepted the gift and completed a clean and fast first run. A penalty time initially noted on the intermediate ranking list forced him to appeal to the race organizers and therefore made him a little nervous.
Shortly before the start of the second run, however, the all-clear was given that it was a mistake.
As a result, Fehr attacked again in the second run, but missed the chance of a clear improvement in time shortly before the finish with a gate error, which led to disqualification.
Another stroke of luck for him: one car ahead of him, Fabian Eggenberger crossed the light barrier in a time that was only 129 thousandths slower than Fehr's target.
This was the first win of the season for last year's overall winner in terms of prize money.
Sandro Fehr: "I'm really pleased and happy about this victory. The twelfth fastest time of the day in the overall classification of all LOC classes, and this with one of the least powerful cars in the field, is certainly a good achievement. Especially on this very fast, demanding and extremely dangerous track."
Another two podium finishes with the same car
Fabian Eggenberger took note of the narrow defeat with a smile and a tear in his eye.
Fabian Eggenberger: "It was clear that Sandro would find his way back to the top and it was only a matter of time. Our first priority in Bure was to get to the finish in one piece."
In contrast to Bière, Heiko Leiber was once again able to alternate with Eggenberger at the wheel of his Suzuki Swift Sport. This reduced costs, but also entailed the risk of overheated tires. And promptly led to disqualification in the first race for the vehicle owner who started after Leiber.
Fabian Eggenberger: "Unfortunately, the hot tires on the rear axle had picked up a lot of dirt in the paddock. I therefore struggled to keep the car on course and had to miss a gate to prevent a spin. I then completed the second race ahead of Heiko, as he had a decent time from the first race. Everything went well for me. It was just a safety run, as I couldn't make any gate mistakes."
High error rate
With a faultless and faster second run than before, Heiko Leiber secured third place, more than four seconds behind the leading duo. His pursuers proved just how high the error rate was on the difficult course.
Without a gate error, Bruno Bleiker would have finished third with his second time, and without three pylons from the first run, Daniel Schneider would have made it onto the podium.
Schneider's clean second ride was still good enough for fourth place, but Bleiker's first time only resulted in sixth place in the L2 class and in the Suzuki classification.
In eighth place behind Dario Zutter, Gilbert Denzer also finished further back than ever before in his best Suzuki season to date.
