Junior-SM: Schmid confirms role as favorite

Finally, the wait for the start of the Swiss Mountain Championship Junior 2018 of the Swiss Race Academy organized by the Eventcenter Seelisberg came to an end for the eight participants. The closer the first start came, the more the pulse of each and every individual rose on Sunday in Reitnau.

Perhaps at least for Thomas Schmid, who is familiar with this tension from his twelve appearances in the Swiss Rally Championship Junior so far. Most of all for those who have never faced any kind of sporting competition at all.

Relief after the clear victory
Schmid did not deny that he was the favorite, but at the end of the day he was happy that everything went according to plan. With two clear best times, the second of which was under the 70-second mark, the 22-year-old from Jonschwil in St. Gallen took a superior victory.

Thomas Schmid: "In the beginning I didn't drive clean enough and a bit crosswise, but I also tried things and ran over the car because of that. Everyone expected me to be fast, so I was relieved that I was already faster in the first practice run than Rolf Reding was last year in the race run."

However, the comparison of times with last year's champion is slightly off. In 2017, the rookies had to complete their two practice runs on wet surfaces and therefore didn't really know how the Toyota GT86 would behave with the Pirelli road tires in the dry race. In addition, they were only allowed to contest one run because of the race cancellation.

But Schmid's 1'09.87 was definitely great. Reding himself won the SuperSeries class up to two liters with the same car, but with slick tires, with two mid-range 1'05 times, as in Hemberg.

Faster, but not more regular
This time the conditions were ideal. And so Marcel Wälchli in the first run and Sven Indermühle in the second run also came in under Reding's class record of 1'11.53 set in 2017.

With 1'11.17, Indermühle achieved the second-best time behind those of Schmid. In the addition, however, he was no longer able to oust his Bernese canton colleague from second place.

Nevertheless, the latter was not entirely satisfied with this.

Marcel Wälchli: "With a gap of almost three seconds in the standings, the difference to the front is too big. I was a bit too aggressive. At least I was able to defend second place thanks to the good first run."

Last year, the distances were much smaller, also the first podium remained the same as the second and third. So with tension one can look forward to the next two races in Anzère (July 22) and Oberhallau (August 26), whether Reitnau already reflected the balance of power.

Large gap to the rear
In order to bring variety to the top three positions this time, the five other juniors will have to improve tremendously.

Luca Hodel was fourth with a best time of 1'14,08, more than eight seconds behind Schmid, and Brian-David Prina with 1'14,24 as best time already 9,06. Hodel was satisfied insofar as at his premiere nothing broke and Prina had not really warmed up with the car or the track.

Yves Meier finished sixth, already 13.78 behind, and Desirée Blumer seventh with 16.67. At least the visibly nervous Switzer, coached by last year's runner-up Lukas Eugster, showed the biggest improvement from training to the race: "I went as fast as I thought I could."

Luck in misfortune for Fabian Hug
Fabian Hug was made to feel that this can also end differently. In the first race run, the poor guy stepped on the gas a bit too early at the exit of the first long left-hand bend and subsequently spun into the cornfield. Fortunately, neither his car nor his morale suffered any major damage.

On the contrary, he could even draw a positive conclusion.

Fabian Hug: "When the rear end broke away, I should have countersteered more quickly. But I was mega lucky. Now I know where the limit is and can learn from it."

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