For the final round of the 2024 Goodyear FIA European Truck Racing Championship, the team travelled directly from Le Mans to Circuito del Jarama close to the Spanish capital Madrid. Following a week of rain and wind, the team was glad to be greeted by some glorious sunshine. Without too much pressure, the team had 2.5 days to set up in the paddock and to go over the race truck one more time before heading into the first race day on Saturday.
The two free practice sessions in the morning were very promising. Antonio did not disappoint as he secured 3rd place on the grid for race 1.
All of our guests from Varta, Nissens, PE and BPW Trapaco enjoyed an excellent first race with Antonio defending his position and talking the step onto the podium in 3rd place!
At the second race, Antonio had to line up in 6th place. At the start, he got pushed out and lost two places to Sascha and Kiss. He regained places during the first couple of laps, but then couldn’t avoid contact with Rodrigues. The truck suffered some damage to the panels and unfortunately – due to the force of impact – a damper and spring snapped meaning Antonio had to retire from the race early.
The final race day of the year got underway with some huge delays. During warm up and qualifying of both the European and the Spanish series, three trucks flew off which caused a delay of more than 2 hours to the day’s schedule. Luckily, all teams were working flat out together getting all trucks back out on track for the races – all in the spirit of our one truck family.
Due to a penalty from the crash in race two, Antonio had to line up in P7 for the first race on Sunday.
The team and Antonio knew that the 4th position in the overall standings was safe and, unfortunately, the gap to P3 was too big. So, Antonio and the team took the tactical decision to drop back one place to P8 to allow Antonio a race start from pole at the 4th race.
The plan worked out: In front of all of his fans and on his home circuit, Antonio managed to bring home the lead and took victory in the final race of the 2024 Goodyear FIA ETRC!
On Sunday night, the official FIA awards ceremony took place. Together with the complete team and some of our partners who joined us over the weekend, we celebrated the season finale!
At his point, we want to express a massive thank you to all of our supporters, fans and partners who really strengthened us throughout the season with their great support. Now, we are already looking forward to be back in 2025!
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