Hello,
last Saturday we entered the third event of this season at the Karksi Nuia track in the South of Estonia. It's a very nice track that gets very rough and especially 2 climbs with soft sand can be technically demanding. With the 19:30 ferry we arrived in Tallinn at 21:30 and during our ride to our hotel in Viljandi it started to rain. The rain showers continued most part of the night but during the day it stayed dry. The organization made some adjustments to have a rideable track even it was soft at some spots during practice.
We didn't do very well during practice and ended up last. Back in the paddock we checked the hack and the rear shock was the problem. No visible damage but something was wrong inside and it had not enough damping. Luckily we could borrow a rear shock from Lehtinen/Hietala and were able to start.
In the meantime the track started to get drier and we went to the start gate. The first corner in Karksi Nuia is narrow with 20 sidecars and we took it easy. Also no idea how the rear shock would behave. But it all worked out fine and we improved our lap times with 5 seconds compared to our training session even the track had become already rather rough. We drove our own laps with no one directly in front or behind us. With the sign for the last 2 laps shown we approached a particular nasty climb, directly after a corner and deep sand with some large stones. An other team had gotten problems and blocked the "easiest" line. I tried to pass them outside but my choice of line wasn't the best one. A sand berm got too high and we were stuck once again. At the end of the heat it's terrible to try to get the hack to the top. In a short time 4 or 5 other sidecars had joined us. After some intensive pulling and pushing we could continue and finished the race. At least some points and the 14th position was our reward.
With the start of the second heat we started to push a little bit more now we knew that the rear shock was okay. We followed Lehtinen/Hietala for 4 laps very close, never more than 5-10 meters between us. Our lap times improved again with 3 seconds even the track was worse now. But after some time I started too feel the efforts of the day and the battery went flat. Driving at a much slower pace and choosing the easiest lines we did loose so much time that we ended last.
Except for getting stuck at the climb in the first heat driving went well. Some extra training sessions to get more endurance are needed. We drove off immediately after the race back to Tallinn to fetch the 22:30 ferry.
Results Mylaps (KV = sidecars): http://www.mylaps.com/en/events/895331
Trip Google maps: http://goo.gl/maps/vvLtU
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