Suzuki Cup 2021: Beautiful, but not as usual

Sunday, October 3. During the break between the morning practice and the afternoon race, a small group of Suzuki riders stands together at the Ambri airfield and discusses. In the middle of it Fabian Eggenberger and the author.

A special championship
When asked how it feels to be competing in the final round of the 2021 Suzuki Swiss Racing Cup after just two race weekends, the Zurich garage owner takes the floor.

Fabian Eggenberger: "The championship is not like it usually is. There was no real racing feeling after the long break, but at least we got to drive for a change. I'm also not as focused and nervous as I used to be, even though the starting position is still open."

Second victory of the runner-up
Less than two hours later, Eggenberger was the winner and the only one to have won twice in four races. However, the old and new runner-up was no longer able to prevent Marcel Muzzarelli, who was once again the most consistent among the fastest, from winning the title.

Only two points, corresponding to two slightly less good positions in four rankings, separated Eggenberger in the final table from the successful defending champion from Riedt bei Erlen.

Praise for Suzuki and Yokohama
Nevertheless, he is satisfied because he managed a hammer time in the most difficult race conditions of the whole afternoon. This put him in 38th place out of a total of 119 classified drivers in the field of nationals, who on top of that found increasingly few wet conditions. And this, nota bene, with a pure production car with prescribed semislicks from Yokohama!

This speaks for the chauffeur as well as for the Suzuki Swift Sport and the product of the series tire partner. Also the champion, who achieved third place despite a goal error (see current  Report from Ambri), raved afterwards.

Marcel Muzzarelli: "We've never had so much water as here. Nevertheless, the car is very good-natured and controllable. The car and tires are just very good."

There is nothing cheaper
Michaël Béring made similar comments after the rookie set the fourth-best time in the wet. Until now, the son of legendary European mountain champion Jean-Claude Béring has mainly driven in the Super Series with slicks.

Michaël Béring: "I can't think of anything more cost-effective that is so much fun. You don't have to put any effort into it on the racecourse."

As the only driver besides the Flammer Speed Team, the man from the Jura brought a new hybrid model to the start. As a rookie who didn't sign up until 2021, he was obliged to do so.

No question that he does not regret this investment now and can consider it as such in the future. Because there is much to suggest that Suzuki Automobile Switzerland, as a generous supporter and sponsor, will prioritize for 2022 for marketing reasons.

Hybrid also catches on in sports
Patrick Flammer did the best advertising for this in Saturday's race on the dry track. It was actually expected that the disadvantages of the hybrid's higher weight and lower power would be more easily compensated for in the wet.

But on Sunday, the man from Glarus was a little off his game because he was also racing in the national field in a TCR touring car and on Saturday evening in the Equipe Bernoise club race. SO resulted only in eighth place, which was not changed by a gate error in the faster second run.

Amazing Reto Steiner
Reto Steiner coped better with this double burden, finishing second on Sunday in the Suzuki Cup and with a Ford Escort RS in the E1-2000 respectively.

There's no better way to master the constant switching between front- and rear-wheel drive, race and street tires, and production and race cars - hats off to the Schwyzer's performances!

Good chance utilization in the Flammer Speed Team
Happy about this was also his Suzuki team boss Karl Flammer, whose rental car he moved and thus collected valuable points for the Flammer Speed Team in Ambri.

In Frauenfeld, Patrick Flammer, who scored for the individual classification this time, took over this task together with Alexander Ullrich. The jokers stung and gave the Glarus team third place in the championship, just two points behind Eggenberger.

Fehr slips off the podium
Sandro Fehr would also have been in contention for the final podium in Ticino. On the first day of the race, however, he "only" managed fifth place after posting the second-best practice time, a position he repeated on Sunday in the wet after even setting the fastest practice time in the morning.

Sandro Fehr: "The rain in the morning was just very good, and I wanted to repeat this in the second race run when it mattered. Unfortunately, it was just not as clean."

True, his best time in training would have been enough for the third podium after Frauenfeld, but so the Flammer Speed Team pushed him to fourth place in the championship.

Best of the Rest
Jean-Claude Debrunner stood out as the best behind the top quartet, his consistency bringing him to the fifth final place even without the longed-for podium finish. With a respectable gap on points, Ralf Henggeler and Michaël Béring are ranked sixth and seventh overall in 2021 thanks to their strong performances in the final rain race.

On Saturday, Rico Thomann topped his already respectable result from Frauenfeld with 7th place as a double starter in Flammer's hybrid Suzuki. His points put him in 8th place overall as the second best rookie in 2021 behind Béring.

Son wins the family duel
Only a shadow of his former self was Roli Graf, who came to Ticino in sixth place overall and lost three positions in the standings with the completely atypical 16th and 19th places.

Thanks to good midfield rankings across all four races, Stefan Böhler, Heiko Leiber and Rolf Tremp make it a full dozen in the championship. Incidentally, Leiber conceded his first narrow defeat on Saturday against his son Narkym, with whom he shares the car.

Advance of the French
Also worth mentioning are the performances of Gautier Henchoz and Jean-Luc Janz, who each managed their first top-10 result in one of the two Ambri slaloms. Together they finished in 13th place and, together with other Romands who joined them, ensured that not only the Swiss-German dialect was spoken in the Suzuki Swiss Racing Cup 2021.

Partner duel
And last but not least, Alexandra Mühlethaler is also making steady progress towards the front of the field. She was unfortunately the only lady in the field in the past mini season, after there were up to four in 2019.

Alexandra measured herself directly with the men anyway, especially with Michael Spörri. Except for the first of the two races in Frauenfeld, his life partner gave him the slip, after it was mostly the other way around two years ago. Holding hands, they proved at the last award ceremony that now the house is not crooked because of that...

Final ranking Suzuki Swiss Racing Cup 2021

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