European Mountain Championship: Record wins by Merli and Meisel 🎥
PEOPLE'S FESTIVAL IN PORTUGAL As previously in France and Austria, European champion Christian Merli won the Rampa da Falperra in a new record time. Reto Meisel achieved the first European Championship victory in the touring cars. In perfect weather conditions, the third round of the European Hillclimb Championship near Braga in Portugal turned out to be a real public festival. Thousands of spectators witnessed how the South Tyrolean [...]
In perfect weather conditions, the third round of the European Mountain Championship near Braga in Portugal turned into a real public festival. Thousands of spectators witnessed the South Tyrolean Christian Merli setting another record on the similarly fast track to St-Ursanne-Les Rangiers. The defending champion lowered this to 1'46.944 in his Osella FA30 with special Zytek V8 engine from LRM in the first race run, beating his own best mark from the previous year by almost a second. The average speed on the 5200-meter track was 175.044 km/h.
For Merli, it is the third win of the season in the European Mountain Championship after Col Saint-Pierre and Rechberg and the first stage victory in Portugal. Previously, Simone Faggioli was the boss here for years. The ten-time European champion finished second overall in the Norma M20 FC, winning the sports car class.
Third place overall for Lampert, serious accident for Petit
Christoph Lampert, who is looked after by Merli, performed superbly. The Vorarlberg driver was third fastest in his Osella FA30 at the first start in Portugal, beating French mountain champion Sébastien Petit and several other competitors with powerful three-liter V8 engines.
However, this became a minor matter on Sunday evening after Petit had a serious accident with his Norma. Fortunately, the Frenchman suffered no injuries in the violent, multiple impacts into the guard rails, which withstood the immense forces. For this reason, all the racing car drivers who would have taken their turn after Petit decided not to take part in the third race round.
Cautious Joël Volluz
The comparison with Joël Volluz shows how highly Lampert's performance should be rated. The Valais native also competed for the first time at the European Championship round in Portugal, but had to settle for ninth place and fifth in the race cars. With his Osella FA30, Volluz lost almost twelve seconds to Lampert, taking no unnecessary risks in his first full season since the serious accident in 2016.
Reto Meisel reports back
For Reto Meisel, the long journey to a European Championship mountain race finally paid off in terms of results. After falling victim to technical defects in Portugal and Spain in 2018, as well as two weeks ago at the Rechberg race (where a clutch defect prevented him from starting the race), the man from Aargau now played out the potential of his Mercedes SLK340 to the very end.
Internationally assigned to the E2-SH (Silhouette) group, he took a total of almost 3.5 seconds from his strongest rival Vladimir Vitver in the Audi TT-R DTM and thus celebrated group victory. In eleventh place overall, Meisel was also faster than Fabien Bouduban from the Jura in the second Norma V8 sports car from Team Faggioli.
Detailed report and video highlights on the Internet
The detailed report can be read on the HillClimbFans homepage, illustrated with more photos by Teambeyou.
A four-minute montage of the biggest hill climb in Portugal by Brais Lopez Video with impressive high-speed scenes is available at the link youtu.be/c_yB0bI_aNc to see.
