Win No.5 puts Rheinard within reach of 6th Reedy Race title
Marc Rheinard is within reach of a sixth Reedy Race title after the Infinity driver wrapped up Day 2 with a 5th win at the 20th running of the event. The new overnight leader going into the final day at Tamiya Raceway, his title hopes boosted further in the final round as main challenger Viktor Wilck’s day came to a crashing finish, the Serpent driver running in to the rear of heat leader Juho Levanen. Leaving the Swede who took three wins earlier in the day with a fifth for the round, it also handed Ronald Volker a win that puts the reigning champion in contention for a podium as he moves up to third in the points ranking with 8 of the 12 races completed. A bad round for Day 1 leader Meen Vejrak, the Yokomo driver’s chances of a podium took a major hit as he ended the day with a 7th dropping to sixth in the standings. While not a contender for overall honours, Awesomatix Viljami Kutvonen would be the third winner of Round 8, the Finn become the 11th of the 24 invite drivers to register a win.
Leading by a massive 6-points with four races remaining, a very happy Rheinard said, ‘What can I say, again it as a good start for me as something happened again at the front’. Starting from 6th on the grid, the 4-time Onroad World Champion would battle for the win against 4-time Offroad World champion Ryan Cavalieri, the Associated driver having started on pole. With the American Running slightly wide in the sweeper this was all Rheinard needed to make a pass that would earn him his 2nd win of the day. Commenting on the pass, he said, ‘I knew Cav was fast so I didn’t want to do anything stupid to try pass him. I knew to finish 2nd would be OK as Viktor crashed in the race before but then he went a little wide and I got him on the inside’. Asked about his lead going into tomorrow, he replied, ‘For sure the chances are good for me now so I will try to drive smart. Sometimes 3rd will be enough so I will use my brain tomorrow’.
A clearly annoyed Wilck reacted to his incident with Levanen by saying, ‘I don’t know why this guy is here. He pretty much f#@k my race and basically decided who the winner is’. The 2012 Champion continued, ‘He tapped my back at the start. Then I was just waiting behind. He was backing off for 4-minutes and then he slammed the brakes’. Giving his view of the incident, Levanen said, ‘I was just driving defensive and got taken out’. The Finn added, ‘he messed up his own race, 2 points would have been a lot better than 5 points. Why risk it’.
Now on the same points as Wilck but with half the number of wins, Volker said, ‘at least now we have a chance for a podium’. On his second win, the World Champion said, ‘we changed a lot on the set-up and at least now I had the steering I want but I had to fight the rear the whole race, I lost it a few times’. The Yokomo driver continued, ‘the last three laps we were so close together and until the last lap I had not planned any attacks but to wait and see what happens. Then Juho and Viktor crashed and I could take the win. We struggled today with the car but I have decent starting grids tomorrow so we can try to finish somewhere on the podium’. Behind Volker, his normal touring car arch rival Bruno Coelho sits fourth one point back going into the final day of his Reedy Race debut. While he had one DNF, the Xray driver has never been outside the Top 3 in the the other 7 races so a podium is still possible for the ETS Champion.
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