Young trio wins the TCR Baltic Trophy at Palanga

The 2018 TCR Baltic Trophy was awarded yesterday in the Aurum 1006Km Race at Palanga, Lithuania.
Victory went to the ALM Motorsport Cupra TCR driven by a trio of young drivers who represented the three Baltic countries: Justas Jonušis (16-year old from Lithuania), Robin Vaks (18 from Estonia) and Reinis Nitišs (22 from Latvia). 
Seven teams competed in the class within a field of 37, and impressed for their performance. In fact, for most of the 8-hour and 43-minute race, the top three TCR cars ranked fourth, fifth and sixth in the overall classification.
Eventually the ALM Motorsport Cupra took fourth place behind three Porsche GTs, the DHL Racing Team Cupra DSG was classified fifth and the London Grill Racing Team Cupra DSG finished eighth.
In Qualifying, Dutch driver Kevin Abbring topped the class and set the sixth fastest lap overall in the Hyundai i30 N entered by the Hegelmann Transporte Group.
The Hyundai led the class for the first half of the race, in fourth overall, and was closely chased by the DHL Racing Team and the ALM Motorsport cars. After four hours, the gaps were 12 seconds between the first two and 42 seconds between the second and third. After 6 hours the DHL Racing Team took the lead, seven seconds ahead of ALM Motorsport, while the Hyundai dropped to third.
One hour later the ALM Motorsport moved up to the front just before the Hyundai pitted after losing a front wheel and that was the end of the race for Abbring and his Lithuanian teammates Deividas Jocius, Egidijus Valeiša and Mindaugas Liatukas, which promoted the London Grill Racing car to third.
With less than one hour to go, the DHL Cupra lost two laps in the pits for changing the brake pads, meaning that Ramunas Čapkauskas, Audrius Stasiulevičius, Kasparas Vaškelis and Saulius Girdauskas had to settle for second.