Mike Halder muscles his way to win Race 2
After being stripped by a penalty of a possible victory in yesterday’s Race 1, Mike Halder made up for that disappointment and muscled his way to win the second race at Oschersleben.
Halder’s teammate Dominik Fugel’s Honda Civic was pushed from the grid to the pit lane and did not take the start. Antti Buri sprinted from the second row and squeezed between pole sitter Petr Fulín and Luca Engstler to take the lead. But the race was red-flagged on the first lap after Simon Reicher spun and caused a pile up that eliminated Marcel Fugel, Sebastian Steibel, Kai Jordan, Loris Prattes and Jasmin Preisig plus Reicher himself, while Theo Coicaud’s and Harald Proczyk’s cars suffered damage but were able to restart.
The race resumed behind the safety car with Buri’s Audi leading from Fulín’s Cupra, Niels Langeveld’s Audi, Luca Engstler’s Volkswagen and Halder’s Honda.
However, Buri was given a drive through for jump-start and Fulín inherited the leadership. But Halder was on a charge, he overtook Engstler for third on lap 5, then came together with Langeveld and moved up to second. The clash was investigated by the Stewards who decided that it did not require further actions.
On the last lap Halder overtook Fulín and crossed the line first, with Langeveld third from Engstler and Florian Thoma. Race 1 winner Proczyk was classified sixth, followed by Benjamin Leuchter who completed an outstanding recovery from 28th on the starting grid.
Only half points have been awarded for the second race because on the long suspension, which means that after the first weekend, Proczyk leads the standings with 56 points, two more than Langefeld and eight ahead of Engstler.
The second race meeting of the TCR Germany will take place at Most, Czech Republic, on 28/29 April.
