Foust tops Lydden Hill

Tanner Foust dominated the final at the first round of the FIA European Rallycross Championship, taking lights-to-flag victories in both the semi-final and the final. The American had his troubles along the way, a puncture in heat one made it hard work though the heats, but a set of consistently fast times put him back in contention.

Jussi-Petteri Leppihalme came from the back row of the final to earn second place on his supercar debut. Davy Jeanney finished third on track in the final, but in post-event technical checks he was dropped down to sixth following a technical infringement. Timmy Hansen, who finished fourth, claimed the remaining podium position thanks to Jeanneys demise. Hansen was the talking point of the paddock though the qualifying heats, setting three fastest times to lay down his marker at the start of his full-time career move into the sport.

Fourth place in the final went to homeboy Julian Godfrey, who scored his best ever finish in a car that was using tyres from last season. Timur Timerzyanov started on the front row of the final after winning the second semi-final, but contact with a kerb punctured the front left tyre of his Citroen DS3, halting his progress.

The new-for-2013 format of the European Rallycross Championship made an interesting change to the final races of the event. Alexander Hvaal originally qualified on row two of the first semi-final, but following an engine failure at the end of heat four he was unable to take to the start, Andy Scott joining the back of the race in his place, since he was the first outside the automatic semi-final qualification. The race would also loose Liam Doran before the start, the team unable to fix a broken engine mounting, allowing Henning Solberg to take to the gird.

Sadly for Petter Solberg his weekend of misfortune would end in more during semi-final one as the power steering stopped working on his Citroen DS3. Andy Scott was having a good race until he too got a puncture.

In the second semi-final Andreas Bakkerud had to withdraw after four heats, allowing Stig-Olav Walfridson back into the equation. Anton Marklund pulled off at the end of the first lap when his steering wheel came loose, and Davey Jeanney was lucky to get through to the final, spinning his way over the finish line with a rear puncture.

In Super1600 Ulrik Linnemann took the final win with relative ease, jokering early and picking off his rivals as they jokered. Ildar Rakhmatulin was looking on for a good result until contact with Linnemann made him loose ground. Eric Faren was impressive all weekend and fully deserved to be on the podium.

In TouringCars Derek Tohill lead Robin Larsson through the semi-final and the final to take what looked like a straightforward victory. The Irishmans team had to work hard for it though, clutch and throttle problems on day one making sure they had their work cut out to claim victory. Roman Castoral finished third.

Full results for the event can be found here.

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