Andrea Cristiani nos habla del EC 2010

Uno de los pilotos con mas presente y futuro del panorama mundial nos cuenta como fue el europeo 2010 en Locorotondo. Clasifico para semis desde clasificatorias y remonto hasta la final quedando en un magnifico quinto puesto. Los que estuvieron alli nos cuentan que en la final Crisitiani era un tiro, pero el mano a mano con Collari le privo de un cajon.

"Last weekend we were in Locorotondo for the most important 1/8 race of this year, the european champioship. Locorotondo is located in Apulia, in the south of Italy..that is to say sun and great food!! For all the week a great weather permitted everybody to enjoy this event. The track is very fast so if you could find a good engine you already made half of the set-up work.. in fact during the first practice days we focused on choosing the best engine-pipe combo. Another important aspect to keep in mind was the fuel consumption (some drivers couldn't even make 3.30 minutes with the 125cc fuel). With one engine I could make easily 4.30 minutes but the engine power is so important on this track that it costed me about 0.3 seconds per lap!! With the most powerful engine I had to refuel every 3.50 minutes..and after a rapid calculation from my dad it was clear that we needed to prefer the power instead of a low fuel consumption.My car seemed imediatly fast but the main problem was the traction..sometimes I didn't even know where my car would go after the corner..the second problem was that I lost much steering off-throttle when the temperature increased..Me and my dad spoke a bit and we decided to change something in the set-up: we moved from pink to red (softer) spring in the rear in order to gain traction, we moved from black to green (softer) spring in the front in order to loose less steering with the hot and we moved from +1 to +3 the front downstops. After these changes my car was simply perfect..easy to drive and even fast. The last thing we tested were the bodies but, maybe due to the fact that we made the set-up on the V2 Zytec body, we found no improvements with the others. We were then ready for the qualifications.Unfortunately I couldn't take part to the first two rounds which turned out to be the fastest heats..anyway in the third one I could set the 9th overall time under very hot conditions..in the fourth and last one nothing changed..so I had the number 3 in the A semi-final, behind Ielasi and Vrielijnck. After the start I kept my third position but after a few laps Vrielijnck made a mistake so I could move up to second. For me it was already enought to finish like this because it would mean a sure access to the final, but my car worked great and I could follow Ielasi. After some minutes Daniele hit gearbox problems so I could take the lead and wait till the end of the semi. All went perfect till the end so in the final I started with the number 5. At the starting sound I jumped in front of Pirani and we started a nice battle that lasted for some laps with nice overtakings. Pietsch and Balestri started to gain some advantage on the rest of the competitors. After some minutes Pirani suffered some problems that caused his retire. At this point I was behind Collari and I was faster than him but as everyone knows it's not easy to overtake him..I tried to pass him on the track but I never succeded in this..so I decided to take some risk in the pitlane since our fuelstops were made in different laps..and this strategy worked since he came out from the pitlane just behind me. But unfortunately after the tyre change he went again in front of me. I tried again to pass him but I made a mistake in the chicane. My car hit a protection with the rear side and a shock absorber came out from the uniball. I came back in the pitlane but maybe the shock absorber was still in a quite-right position so my mechanics saw nothing wrong and just let me out again. The car didn't work good anymore but I was still in third position since Collari made also a mistake that costed him some time. After the following pit-stop the shock absorber came completely out and at this point the car was undriveable. I came again in the pit and this time my mechanics took the shock absorber in the right position again. The car behaved good again and I was now on 4th position again just behind Collari, but I needed one more fuelstop than him..unfortunately during another overtaking attempt on Collari my engine flamed out and I lost around one more lap..so now also the 4th position was gone and I could just end my race on 5th..it's a shame because the podium was something possible..but in Italy we say that with the "if" and the "but" you can make nothing..so I have to be happy with my 5th place. Serpent proved to be fast with 3 cars in the main final and also the laptimes were good.Congratulation to the new European champion Robert Pietsch for the great performance and win.Thanks to my dad Marcello, to Pasquale for the pitwork and to my sponsors:Serpent, Max Power, Enneti, Sanwa, Runner Time.

Till next time

Ciao ciao

Andrea"