Aleksey Dudukalo gets back into the title fight
With an authoritative victory in the second race at Smolensk, Aleksey Dudukalo has managed to relaunch his odds in the fight for the TCR Russia title. The men from LUKOIL Racing Team made the most out of the commotion at the start and bid farewell to the rest of the company on the way to claim his second win of the season with a large margin over Pavel Kalmanovich and Kirill Ladygin. The latter is still leading the standings, but his advantage over Dudukalo has been cut to 33 points.
At the start, pole sitter Dmitry Bragin and Kalmanovich clashed into Turn 1; Bragin was pushed wide and dropped to 11th, while Dudukalo who was fourth on the grid found a gap and took the lead ahead of Kalmanovich and Andrej Maslennikov.
The race became processional until half-way, then a six-way battle for P2 began with Kalmanovich chased by Maslennikov, Ladygin, Grigory Burlutskyi, Ivan Lukashevich and Klim Gavrilov.
In lap 13, Lukashevich retired after breaking a rear wheel over a kerb, then in lap 16, while trying to pass Maslennikov, Ladygin opened a gap for Burlutskyi who went for it. They made contact and were both passed by Gavrilov who moved into P4.
At the beginning of the final lap, Maslennikov and Gavrilov clashed and this time it was Ladygin who managed to take on the inside and overtook them both, while Maslennikov dropped back with a flat rear tyre.
Unchallenged, Dudukalo took the chequered flag with large margin over Kalmanovich, while Ladygin recovered a third place that might prove crucial in the title fight. After the race, Kalmanovich was given a five-second penalty for the incident with Bragin at the start, which dropped him to fourth and promoted Ladygin and Gavrilov to second and third.
The next event of TCR Russia will be at Nizhniy Novgorod in two-week time.
Race 2
1. Aleksey Dudukalo (LUKOIL Racing Team, Audi RS 3 LMS), 18 laps
2. Kirill Ladygin (LADA Sport Rosneft, LADA Vesta Sport), 13.031
3. Klim Gavrilov (VRC-Team, Hyundai i30 N), 13.800
4. Pavel Kalmanovich (AG Team, CUPRA), 16.719
5. Grigory Burlutskyi (Carville Racing, Hyundai i30 N), 17.203
Championship points
1. Kirill Ladygin 163 pts; 2. Aleksey Dudukalo 130; 3. Mikhail Mityaev 123
Picture: Grigory Golyshev
