To finish first…

At 45 the entry in the Polish ERC round is the second smallest of the year so far; Portugal holding the dubious honour of being the smallest event with just 41 cars. Consisting of 18 starters in each of the Supercar and Super1600 categories and nine TouringCars, the quest for points this weekend should be relatively easy – as long as the car is reliable enough to make it to the end of the event, that is.

Each of the three classes already has a driver in trouble, and at the top of the tree its is points leader and defending champion Sverre Isachsen who has struck problems early. It’s not a huge failing, but enough to give his team work they could do without between the two free practice sessions that are running back-to-back. “A bearing in the turbocharger has broken, not a big problem,” said Isachsen while assisting his son Sander with a Lego kit while his engineers and Julian Godfrey tackled the turbo problem.

TouringCar man of the moment Roman Častoral failed to set a time in the first session after electrical problems brought his Opel to a halt and Julien Debin, back with French team JSA for his second event of the year, also failed to set a time after the throttle cable in his Peugeot broke.

At the bottom of the Supercar time sheets is Pat Doran; “I feel lucky to be alive after that!” he said having survived four wild laps in the first session, “The rollcage is so close to my left arm that I have to let go of the wheel with my left hand to get left lock on. That felt dangerous!”

Fastest, for what it’s worth at this stage, are Davy Jeanney, Krzysztof Skorupski and Lars Øivind Enerberg.

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