Schmid: Finally a 6h victory 🎥
RX-START double Swiss champion Thomas Schmid took part in a 6-hour rallycross in Portugal and finished as the winner together with the Portuguese Toni and Antonio Texeira, who live in Switzerland. Thomas Schmid came to a rallycross event with a Peugeot 208 R2 in Portugal at short notice via three corners. In the PT Racing Team, he replaced Junior José [...]
Thomas Schmid got a rallycross outing in a Peugeot 208 R2 in Portugal at short notice via three corners. He replaced Junior José Texeira in the PT Racing Team. As the 2018 Swiss Junior Rally Champion and a former autocross driver, Schmid is very familiar with the vehicle and the discipline.
Clear training best time
The rallycross at the Circuito de Lousada lasted six hours. The starting field consisted of 29 small touring cars, of which the two Peugeots from PT Racing were the fastest.
With a time of 40.642 seconds, the Swiss guest driver set the best practice time by more than half a second on the 870-meter course, which also serves as a spectator SS at the big Rally Portugal.
The inboard video shows his qualifying round:
https://www.facebook.com/1691844477721538/videos/218630579029789
Swiss-Portuguese partnership
Schmid's partners were team boss Paulo Antunes as well as father and son Toni and Antonio Texeira, who live in Switzerland. Like Schmid, Antonio Texeira is no unknown quantity. At the end of October, he won both Cayman GT4 Clubsport sprint races in the Porsche Sports Cup Suisse in Misano.
Things were not quite so simple in the race.
Thomas Schmid: "There were many safety car phases, which influenced the tactics. It didn't look good for us for a long time because we were eight laps behind after four hours. But we made it to the finish line in first place, partly because the leader retired with a technical defect. We also had to worry at the end because the battery voltage dropped."
This video shows what happened:
Uncertain future
Thomas Schmid's 2018 racing season, in which he won two Swiss junior championship titles (rally and mountain), ended with another victory.
What the 23-year-old from St. Gallen will drive in 2019 depends on the budget. The aim would be to take part in the European Junior Rally Championship.
