With 3 points already under his belt thanks to pole position yesterday, Brock Kidd arrived on Sunday looking to make it a full 29 points for the weekend. Alongside him, Felipe Cesar will be trying to retake the title lead from his rival, while the two Jaguars of Will Taylor and Oleksandr Zozulya look to catch up to them from fourth and fifth. As the race began, Kidd kept the lead going into turn 1 and paced himself in the opening laps, keeping ahead of Cesar and Ryota Yoshida. Overtaking, as expected, wasn’t easy, but there were some drivers who made up ground. Alexander McLaughlin passed Kip Maxwell at the hairpin on the opening lap, while noticeable Sebastian Bergkvist made up 3 places initially, thanks to some smart moves into the penultimate. None of the top drivers were able to replicate this, but there was drama when, on lap 10, Taylor’s rear left suspension collapsed when exiting the tunnel. He went off into the run-off at the chicane and retired the car – a massive hit to his title hopes.
After a while, Kidd began to push, leaving the Maserati cars in his wake. Neither Cesar or Yoshida could keep up with the Downton and so it was left to Zozulya to catch the leader. He quickly dispatched of the two cars ahead of him – Yoshida at turn 1, Cesar with a nice move at turn 6 – and set off after Kidd. Just behind the top 4, Jochem van Snelheid locked up at turn 1 and went straight into the run-off. He recovered quickly to the track but lost 3 places. This promoted McLaughlin, who had just gotten ahead of Aron Einarsson, to fifth after a great first half of the race. In the midfield, a couple of drivers joined Taylor on the retirements list – Steven Kasami binned it at turn 8, Stuart Harrison pitted with brake issues and Steffen Rosenberg retired with electrical issues, making it a double DNF for Arrow. With both cars in clear air, Kidd and Zozulya traded fastest laps constantly, but it was clear the Ukranian was slowly but surely closing in. Cesar couldn’t live with them, and a sudden tyre failure soon afterwards forced him to retire, marking another retirement amongst the championship protagonists. This promoted his teammate, Yoshida, to the podium, while behind them, Maxwell managed to overtake Einarsson at the chicane to move into fifth, behind McLaughlin. Elsewhere, Rodrigo Sanchez did a “Bergkivist” and nipped past Otso Toivonen at the penultimate corner to move into the points. Judson Sikes also became yet another retiree when he, like Rosenberg, had to pull out with electrical issues. Eventually, in the closing stages, Zozulya caught up to Kidd. However, with the tight streets, Kidd simply needed to drive cleanly and he was unpassable. He fended off Zozulya superbly for ages, but then, with a couple of laps left, he tagged the outside barrier at the final corner and it hurt his momentum. Zozulya needed no second invitation, positioning his car on the inside and taking the lead at turn 1. After that, he blasted off, set another fastest lap for good measure and took his maiden eVirtual victory, a gritty drive to win from fifth in Monaco. Kidd settled for second, while there was another maiden achievement with Yoshida taking his first podium since his VWRS days. McLaughlin’s fourth was another highlight, ahead of Maxwell, Einarsson and van Snelheid. Bergkvist’s opportunistic driving at the start rewarded him with eight, Ivan Lesic returned to the top ten in ninth and Sanchez picked up another point with tenth. Unsurprisingly, this has massive repercussions in the title race. Zozulya moves into the lead, 2 points ahead of Kidd, while Cesar and Taylor lag 23 and 24 points off the Ukrainian respectively. Behind that, Yoshida draws level with Bergkvist on points and van Snelheid moves into the top 10. In the team’s standings, Downton close the gap between them and Jaguar to 23 points. Mitsubishi – singly handily carried by McLaughlin – are just 3 points behind Renault now, and towards the back, Nakley are one point behind Lada.
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