Patrick Schober shed tears in the Victory Lane after scoring his and Double V’s maiden EuroNASCAR 2 victory, which came in a race full of surprises at Oschersleben.
Patrick Schober stole the headlines in the EuroNASCAR 2 division after he and Double V Racing claimed a shock first victory on the Sunday race of NASCAR GP Germany.
The 19-year old Austrian completed a clinical drive in a chaotic race that saw all three primary championship contenders run into trouble, including Saturday’s winner Paul Jouffreau. The recap of the races can be checked in the sections below.
Race 1 Recap
Twenty-one drivers were due to take the start of the first EuroNASCAR 2 race at 17:05 on Saturday, but only twenty took the green flag. Vladimiros Tziortzis was unable to start the race because of a nagging engine trouble.
Tziortzis’ car had been experiencing the engine issues ever since the EuroNASCAR PRO Qualifying session. Even though mechanics from Academy Motorsport and Vict Motorsport did their best to find a solution, the problems were unresolved and it ultimately forced the Cypriot to be in the sidelines.
With the championship leader out of the race before it had even begun, the opportunity presented itself for Paul Jouffreau and Alberto Naska to close their gap to the Cypriot in the standings.
After sixteen laps of hard fought racing, Jouffreau came out on top and scored his second win of the season in the division. The Frenchman also survived a five-second time penalty that he received post-race for jumping the start.
“For sure this victory is good!” said Jouffreau in the Victory Lane. “The pace we have was just really good, but we had some issues with lapped cars that slowed Naska down.”
“Since that moment, I think we both decided to lift off a little bit to preserve the tires for tomorrow. Every time I was lifting, Naska was doing it even more. We preserved our tires well, so I expect it to be a close fight tomorrow!”
Alberto Naska had a shot to beat Jouffreau, but his efforts were thwarted by the SpeedHouse Racing cars of Eric Quintal and Arianna Casoli. Both were running 10 seconds off the pace from the leaders and Naska met them at an inopportune time, causing the Italian to be livid after the race.
“I found a lapped car which was running 10 seconds per lap slower,” said Naska on his encounter with Quintal and Casoli. “I was completely stuck [behind them] in the fast chicane, they’re not respecting the blue flags and I almost crashed into it. I don’t understand why people that go 10 seconds a lap slower decide to race. It’s dangerous!”
“It’s not about having fun or something. If I crashed into it and I didn’t lose my car to avoid it, I could’ve broken my arm, I would’ve ended my championship and I could’ve hurt the other drivers. I don’t understand the point of it.”
Martin Doubek completed the podium after having to defend his position from both Gil Linster and Claudio Remigio Cappelli for the whole race. Linster’s challenge faltered when he suffered a slow puncture late in the race, but Cappelli held on to finish fourth and win the Legend Trophy.
Patrick Schober made it to the top-5 from seventh on the grid. Melvin de Groot, Rookie Trophy winner Thomas Toffel, Thomas Dombrowski, Riccardo Romagnoli and Roberto Benedetti rounded out the top-10 positions.
Dominique Schaak finished eleventh on the road, but a 5-second time penalty for a false start dropped him behind Jack Davidson in the final results. Mario Ercoli was 16th in his debut despite a spin on the final lap of the race.
Race 2 Recap
Sunshine greeted the EuroNASCAR 2 drivers on Sunday morning when they started their second race in Germany at 10:30 AM. All 21 drivers took the start of the race with Alberto Naska in pole position.
Naska successfully retained his lead at the start while Paul Jouffreau made a poor getaway and dropped down to fourth. Behind them, Matthias Hauer somehow managed to spin twice in a span of one lap.
That set the tone for the remaining fifteen laps and it showed just after lap 2 began. Gil Linster made an ambitious move on Naska at Hotel and clipped the back end of Naska’s car. The incident spun Naska out and miraculously, everyone managed to avoid hitting him after he went standstill in the middle of the corner.
Linster took the lead, but behind him Patrick Schober managed to sneak his way to second as he was able to take the normal racing line through the long right hander.
The Luxembourgish held the lead until lap 9 where Schober managed to overtake him right before the Full Course Yellow – and later the Safety Car – was called for an incident between Nick Schneider and Riccardo Romagnoli at Hasseroder.
Linster also received a drive through penalty that he, controversially, took under Full Course Yellow. He managed to escape a penalty for it, but his drama was not over as he nearly rammed into Schober at the restart on lap 14.
Also happening in the restart is a massive jump start by his teammate Martin Doubek, who got past both Thomas Toffel and Roberto Benedetti before they had even crossed the start/finish line. That moved the Czech driver up to fourth, which became second following an incident in the final lap.
Claudio Remigio Cappelli had been running in third all-race long and managed to pass Linster at the Shell-Amman Kurve on the final lap. Unfortunately, Linster then rammed into Cappelli’s Ford Mustang, sending the Italian into a spin.
All of these shenanigans were music to Patrick Schober’s ears since the Austrian was able to lead the last three green flag laps without any major interruption and take a shock first career victory for both himself and Double V Racing.
It was an unexpected, but a well deserved victory for the underdogs. The small Italian team had lost their primary chassis in a big wreck at Brands Hatch and after three races running a backup car, they were rewarded with a victory at the final race of the regular season.
“Oh my God, I didn’t actually believe that I would actually win the race!” said an emotional Schober in Victory Lane. “I hoped for a podium, but I’m surprised that I won. The team did a great job and also want to thank my sponsors Keyman, motorSPORTaktiv and Procar Motorsport.”
“I’m really thankful to them and if it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t have the opportunity to do this interview! I fought so much this year, I had such a hard crash in Brands Hatch and now the victory came and I’m so happy!”
The chaos involving Doubek and Linster meant that they lost the podiums that they got in the road. Instead, it was Thomas Toffel who surprisingly managed to score his first career podium finish with an incredible second place finish.
Toffel has had a rough season with three retirements and one disqualification in the previous eight races. However, the former motorcycle racer learned from his mistakes and kept his car clean to make it to the rostrum for the first time in his career.
Finishing third after all the penalties were applied was Melvin de Groot, who expressed his surprise to be on the podium post-race. It was the Dutchman’s third career podium finish and his first at a track outside of Circuit Zolder.
De Groot managed to beat Paul Jouffreau, who survived two off-track excursions. It first happened on lap 4 when he completely misjudged his braking point at Hotel when challenging Cappelli for third. Later, he was forced to go to the grass again to avoid Linster and Cappelli’s final lap incident.
Jack Davidson silently got his way to fifth ahead of Dominique Schaak, who denied Vladimiros Tziortzis of the bonus points for most positions gained. Linster was eventually classified in seventh after receiving a 10-second penalty. Cappelli, Benedetti and Michael Bleekemolen rounded out the top-10 positions.
Martin Doubek’s jump start initially resulted in a 30-second penalty, but it was later reduced to just 15. That allowed him to finish eleventh ahead of Tziortzis, who also got a 10-second penalty for spinning Schaak on lap 3.
Mario Ercoli ran a quiet race to finish 13th ahead of Sven van Laere, who ran off course at Hotel on lap 5. Another spin at the restart thwarted Naska’s comeback plans and he was only 15th at the end. Thomas Dombrowski, Quintal, Casoli, Hauer, Romagnoli and Schneider completed the final results.
While Paul Jouffreau scored the most points in total with 353 points, dropped points meant that it’s Vladimiros Tziortzis who came out of Oschersleben as the championship leader in EuroNASCAR 2.
With Tziortzis dropping his DNS at Oschersleben and his DNF at Most, the Cypriot has 292 points that he will carry to the season finale at Zolder. Alberto Naska dropped his two finishes outside of the top-10 to gain 289 points while Jouffreau was forced to drop two of his 10 top-5 finishes, meaning that he only has 288 points instead of the full 353.
Gil Linster failed to score any points at Oschersleben, but he remains in fourth place with 264 points. Patrick Schober’s first victory moved him up to fifth with 250 points while 2021 champion Martin Doubek remained sixth with 247 points.
Claudio Remigio Cappelli continues to lead the Legend Trophy in seventh place overall, five points behind Doubek’s points tally. Thomas Dombrowski also retained his lead in Rookie Trophy in eighth, but Jack Davidson has closed his deficit to just five points.
Melvin de Groot’s podium allowed him to move to the top-10 in the standings with 212 points, beating teammate Michael Bleekemolen who now has 209 points after he dropped his two worst results. Thomas Toffel is now 15th with 205 points while Arianna Casoli is 17th in the standings.
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