Third win of the season in TCR Eastern Europe for Pekař
Tomáš Pekař won the TCR Eastern Europe’s second race at the Slovakia Ring, and stretched his leadership in the standings to 17 points ahead of Michal Makeš who was classified third. Sebastian Steibel encored his second place from Race 1 and Carol Wittke in fourth position completed a quartet of CUPRA cars on top of the classification.
Pekař started from P5, and by the end of the opening lap he was leading the field. Reversed grid pole sitter Žarko Knego dropped back to P6, while David Němček who was alongside him stalled and was swallowed by the field.
From P3 on the grid, Łukasz Stolarczyk was the best starter and led from Pekař, Steibel, who climbed to third from the eighth position, and local driver Miro Horňák.
During the first lap Stolarczyk made a mistake and dropped to third behind Pekař and Steibel, he then lost the fourth position as well to Horňák and eventually the Pole was given a drive-through for jump-start that he served in lap 6.
The leading duo of Pekař and Steibel pulled away; behind them there was a close fight for P3 that involved Horňák, Tomasz Rzepecki, Wittke and Race 1 winner Makeš. The latter was able to jump the cars in front of him one-by-one and moved into P3. In lap 5, this group lost Rzepecki who retired into the pits with a technical issue.
Steibel closed in on Pekař, but the Czech driver increased his pace and created a small gap until the end of the race, winning by 4 seconds ahead of Steibel, with Makeš completing the podium.
The fight for the fourth position provided the last thrill with Wittke who managed to overtake Horňák at the last turn. Milovan Vesnić, who had started 12th after retiring from yesterday’s Race 1, recovered to finish sixth.
On 11/13 June the championship will resume at Poznán, paying its first visit to Poland.
Slovakia Ring - Race 2
1. Tomáš Pekař (Carpek Service, CUPRA), 12 laps
2. Sebastian Steibel (Steibel Motorsport, CUPRA), 4.144
3. Michal Makeš (Mičánek Motorsport, CUPRA), 8.912
4. Carol Wittke (Fullinrace Academy, CUPRA Leon Competición), 13.252
5. Miro Hornák (Hornák-Aditis, Audi RS 3 LMS), 13.449
Championship points
1. T. Pekař 93 pts; 2. M. Makeš 76; 3. S. Steibel 52
Picture: TCR Eastern Europe/Petr Frýba
