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From Swedespeed.com Motorsport News
Much more tight racing than today’s round of the Swedish Touring Car Championship is hard to find. The 6th round gave you everything you could ask for, and then some. After championship-leader Thed Bjork (Audi) had to break off and park his car without getting any points, the championship is more open than ever. Anyone can bring home the title. Bad luck for Audi, but positive for the tour. "Today Mr Goldenboy (Thed Björk) didn’t have luck on his side– and for that I have a big smile on my face!", says Robert Dahlgren straight after the finish line. Rain, amazingly fast pit-stops, rock-hard fights side by side all the way to the chequered flag, and a completely open championship. After two training sessions and qualification, team Polestar was on fire. Dahlgren made fastest laps over and over again, but unfortunately the weather wasn’t on his or the team’s side during super-pole. After a dry start, the sky opened and lap-times became steadily worse. Dahlgren, who after the reversed start-list came out last on the track had to fight to keep the car on the slippery track. He ended up in 6th place on Sunday’s starting grid and his team-mate Alexander Storckenfeldt was found in 10th position.
You could almost feel the tension when the race was about to start. Too eager drivers caused a re-start, before the race was on. The wet track made it important to position one-self to avoid the spray from the other cars, and it was probably more luck than anything that all drivers made it through the first bend. In the end everything boiled down to tactics around the pit-stop and trying to get ahead of drivers in the pit-lane. Dahlgren came out behind drivers who didn’t move aside in time, and lost more than three seconds, and another three seconds during his first lap because of a yellow flag that kept him from overtaking. Richard Göransson and Duncan Huisman, both BMW, had a last lap of close-contact. Dahlgren was just about to get close enough to start trying to overtake Huisman, when he discovered Dahlgren in his back-mirrors and decided to play it safe to secure his second place. Dahlgren ended 3rd and Storckenfeldt came in on 6th place. After a protest from Thed Bjork, Audi, Storckenfeldt got excluded from the race because of foul play, and lost his championship points. Needless to say, according to Alexander the judges made a wrong decision. "I kept my pace and line when he tried to overtake me. He blocked me, and I turned him around. If he had driven the way others drive, this wouldn’t have happened. Especially Thed should know how to keep it clean", says a disappointed Alex. Robert was not entirely happy either, even though he got six points and now holds a fourth place in the championship standings. "I was by far the fastest driver during test and qualification, so of course I’m disappointed. It would have been the same with a second place. The only thing I expected was to win", says Robert, and continues: "But I did the best I could, and it just Wasn’t enough today." The next race will take place in Karlskoga, where Dahlgren took pole position which he kept ‘til he saw the finish line. Hopefully Polestar Racing will treat us to a re-run! The next race takes place 26-27 August 2006.
2006 Swedish Touring Car Championship Positions after round 6 1) Richard Göransson, BMW, 2) Duncan Huisman, BMW, 3) Robert Dahlgren, Volvo, 4) Jan Nilsson, BMW, 5) Johan Stureson, Peugot, 6) David Björk, BMW STCC news This weekend the new facility at Scandinavian Raceway, Anderstorp was opened. 38 years ago, 1967, the very first motor competition took place, and after that Scandinavian Raceway hosted European and World-cup championships for motorcycles as well as cars. In 17 June 1973 Sweden’s first Formula 1-race was held at Anderstorp, which was followed by an additional five F1-races until 1978. And the weekend of the 12-13th of August a new chapter in the track’s history was written. The track has been through a 15 Million SEK renovation, and has got new depot boxes in a 115 meters long building. On the building’s second floor you’ll find rooms for timekeeping, race control, press room and other service functions. In the northern part a whole new speaker tower has been erected. – Now we have facilities that match international levels, says Anderstorp’s president Kari Lehtimäki. Next to the long depot building has a hall of 15 x 22 meters been built. In this building an upper secondary school will start an educational programme with race drivers and race mechanics as their speciality. Five days a week the facility will function as a school and the last two days it will function as a modern depot for racing and road racing. Team news This weekend Volvo and Polestar had invited thousands of Volvo customers to the racetrack to watch exciting racing and to take part in the different events that was arranged. Volvo had a 1 300 square meters large area filled with different activities for the whole family. Among other things you could try out segway transporters, look at almost all different Volvo-models there are, jump in a giant bouncy castle and compete with radio control cars. The first 30 persons to enter the event area got a ride with one of the STCC-drivers in a Challenge-car. The smile on peoples faces that climbed out of the car was priceless! Volvo-retailers competed in the first of three rounds in a workshop challenge, with service- and repair exercises. The six final teams will be competing with a challenge car. Although the weather was all but nice, at least 2 500 people came to Scandinavian Raceway and Anderstorp. Volvo and Polestar will host two more of these events before the season ends. Next event will be in just two weeks time in Karlskoga. Did You Know? Volvo was as early as in the early 80’s a pioneer to use turbo charger in touring cars, and raced with turbo charged engines. They made it to the top and won the BTCC. In the early 90’s Volvo was the first team to use catalytic converter in touring car racing, when they participated with Volvo 850 station wagon in the BTCC. The 850 sw was aerodynamically superior to the sedans, which led to an intensive lobbying activity for a rule-change of the championship-regulations, speared by the BMW.
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