CHAMPION SIGNS OFF WITH GLORY
KRISTOFFERS SON ON TOP AGAIN IN WRX
History will show that Johan Kristoffersson dominated the 2017 World Rallycross Championship in terms of pure statistics. For the most part those figures are correct, and the Swedish star concluded his title-winning campaign with a dominant display in the final six laps of the year in South Africa to claim his seventh victory of 2017.
The majority of Kristoffersson’s triumphs this season have come from dominating events. However, at the new South African rallycross circuit on the outskirts of Cape Town, it was his compatriot Timmy Hansen who was best placed to score his first win of the campaign, had things played out a little differently for the Peugeot-hansen driver.
A mark of a true champion is being able to take advantage when everything is working in your favour, but also achieving success when you’re arguably not the fastest, too. Just ask Mattias Ekstrom, whose four 2017 victories were down to the outgoing champion’s outright ability and opportunistic racecraft in an Audi S1 that just didn’t have the raw pace of PSRX Volkswagen Sweden’s Polo GTI.
And that’s what Kristoffersson did on the new circuit near Cape Town, in the shadow of Table Mountain.
He might have taken maximum points by topping the intermediate classification, winning semi-final one and the final, but the South African event was a real opportunity for the Peugeot, and to a lesser extent Fordbacked teams, to claim victory.
Hansen laid out his stall by stopping the clocks first in free practice two on Saturday morning after Hoonigan Racing Division driver, Andreas Bakkerud, had been fastest in FP1. In Q1 Hansen set the fastest time, but dropped down the overall order to fourth when, like many of the frontrunners, he picked up a frontleft puncture in Q2.
STARD driver Janis Baumanis was quickest in Q2 to move to second at the end of the opening day, behind leader Ken Block who, in his final outing in the series with the Ford Focus RS RX, had been fifth and then second to lead overnight.
On Sunday morning, Kristoffersson set the fastest time in Q3, but in the final race of Q4 Hansen pitched his 208 WRX sideways at Turn 1 around the outside and led from the front to set his second fastest time of the weekend. With that, he moved to second in the Intermediate Classification behind Kristoffersson, who had also lost time in Q2 and was twice second to Hansen in Q1 and Q4.
Kristoffersson led the first semifinal from lights-to-flag, despite slowing on the exit of his sixth lap joker. His team-mate, Petter Solberg, entered the final round separated from Ekstrom by just one point in the standings for second overall. With Ekstrom right behind his Polo in the semi-final race, Kristoffersson’s slow exit from the joker allowed Solberg, who had already taken his extraroute, to close the gap.
Ekstrom tried to squeeze his Audi between Kristoffersson’s Polo and the barrier at the joker merge, before having side-by-side contact with Solberg on the main track. His car leapt into the air and that forced him to cut the last-corner chicane.
Ekstrom initially finished second behind the new champion, but following the event was dropped to third behind Solberg.
In the second semi-final Hansen lost ground as part of a six-car scrum into the Turn 2 right-hander. Block emerged on top but would later be passed by Hansen after the Swede took a mid-race joker to join Kristoffersson on the front row for the final.
Block had made it through to his first final of the season as team-mate Bakkerud missed out. However, Block was removed from contention when he was disqualified for the car being underweight because the Focus had lost most of its front bodywork in the semi-final battle.
At the start of the final Hansen was forced wide at Turn 1, which was the result of a concertina effect of contact in the entry of the corner, and dropped to fourth. Kristoffersson led Ekstrom and Solberg.
Hansen took a lap-one joker tour as Ekstrom and Solberg battled for the place that would ultimately decide who would be championship runner- up. Hansen later passed both the previous World RX title-holders and Timo Scheider when the trio took their respective joker laps.
Up front, Kristoffersson led throughout, but Hansen’s push after breaking free from traffic with his lapone joker was almost enough to catch the new champion. Kristoffersson just came out of the extra-route in front to notch up another win with Hansen forced to settle for second.
Ekstrom’s third place finish was enough for him to wrap up second in the standings ahead of Solberg, who crossed the line just behind the Swede having made numerous attempts to find a way past.
Scheider was fifth, but Kevin Hansen, who qualified for the final when Block was disqualified from the semi-finals, didn’t make it more than a few metres into the last race of the season when the propshaft on his 2016-specification Peugeot 208 broke as he launched away from the start line.