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From the TTXGP Press Office:
FIM e-Power and & TTXGP Championships at Oschersleben
Team Zongshen notches up a win for Tang Yu after an epic battle where Pole position changed between five riders over a tem lap race
After Ho Chi Fung’s respectable third place in Saturday’s Sprint (three laps), Yu Tang is on the highest step of the podium after today’s FIM e-Power International and TTXGP Championship race. The Zongshen rider took the chequered flag at the end of the ten-lap race ahead of Udo Reichmann (Reichmann Racing-Mavizen) and Christian Amendt (epo-Bike).
Although yesterday’s practice and the three-lap Sprint seemed to augur another win for Münch Racing Teams’ Matthias Himmelmann, Yu Tang played a patient game. The early part of the race saw Matthias Himmelmann in front as expected on an astonishingly powerful Münch TTE that lapped in 1’37.771 in the warm-up. Towards the middle of the race, however, Himmelmann had to leave the front spot to team-mate Katja Poensgen as his batteries were overheating. A few laps later, the former GP250 rider suffered the same fate. Both had to push their motorcycles over the line, but Katja Poensgen was unfortunately outside the authorised time (5 mn).
The German team’s overheating problems could have given a advantage to Ho Chi Fung, who was in clinch with Katja Poensgen on the track, but problems with his electrical system hobbled the rider of the Zongshen 59, who was forced to drop out of the race. These upsets at the front of the field finally gave the man aboard the Zongshen 26, Yu Tang, a chance to shine and bring home the victory on the back of a well managed race. Behind the winner, Udo Reichmann hauled a Mavizen on to podium, not bad for the first weekend racing a eBike. Christian Amendt, took third, proving that perseverence is a key quality in this discipline where nothing stands still for long.
Peter Linden on a Zongshen that was no match for the rest of the field in terms of performance, managed to hang in there, coming in fourth just behind the winning trio. Münch Racing’s Thomas Schuricht and Matthias Himmelmann took fifth and sixth place respectively, saving crucial points
Join us on Friday 7 September at France’s Bugatti circuit for the next event in the FIM e-Power and TTXGP Championships, curtain raiser for the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
What they said…
Yu Tang – 26 / Zongshen
I made a mistake in the first lap and nearly crashed the bike to ended up having to make my way back up the grid. I worked really hard and was concentrating on my own race so didn’t even realise that there was actually a chance to take the pole position and actually win. I have to say it feels amazing to come to Oschersleben and take home this win for my team. They all work so hard fielding three bikes this weekend and most of the credit should go to them. They have built me a reliable bike that is performing really week. Last weekend I was second at Assen and now I am the winner. Incredible for my second season as an eRacer and my second season racing in Europe.
I really wish my team mate Ho Chi Fung gets the bike he deserves for the next round. The team are working hard on the new development bike but there is much to learn with a whole different set up, new motors, battery pack and control systems. I hope at the next round in Le Mans he will be able to join me on the podium.
Christian Amendt – 36 / Epo-bike.de
I was so happy that I was able to manage my small battery pack for such long race whilst keep respectable lap times. It was awesome to finish 3rd and get on the podium here in Germany. I have to say it was also really great to have so many good quality competitors here this weekend and a lot of spectators. I found the whole weekend really good fun especially with the introduction of the new sprint race, which I feel is a really good idea.
Katja Poensgen – 65 / Münch Racing
In the race I was following Ho Chi Fung for a few laps to see how his bike was performing. I felt confident I could over take him but thought I would hang back behind him till the final lap as I know my bike had the potential to over heat so I didn’t want to push it. But the bike just stopped. I reset it and set of again to carry on racing and it was operating ok but it stopped once more. This time the Marshalls wouldn’t let me out again and my race was over.
Matthias Himmelmann – 49 / Münch Racing
I was really confident going into the race at the front of the grid. I was hoping to really push the bike as far as I could and set a circuit record for the weekend within the actual race but the energy just gave up. Actually the last time a raced with my white race leathers I also didn’t finish the race; I now will NEVER wear these leather to race again, they always bring me bad luck. After the first lap I was in the front of the field but the bike stopped in lap 4, I got it started but it stopped again so I pulled into the pit lane to check the voltages and temperatures. Everything seemed to be ok so I went back onto the track but it was a horrible race for me. The bike stopped two more times, each time I reset it and started again but the last time was 200m from the chequered flag. This time it would not start again and I pushed it across the finish line. Now the team must take all this data and work very hard to work on the bikes and solve the heating problems. We are looking forward to racing in Le Mans for the next joint TTXGP and FIM epower race and hope to put todays result firmly behind us. I want to thank my sponsors Windreich for backing my team and helping us make this weekend energy from clean resources.
Udo Reichmann – 72 / Reichmann Racing - Mavizen
I wanted to thank my team for giving me an opportunity to take part in the race weekend. It was a fun experience and the engineers got my bike to the most perfect setting by the time the race was here. It was a great result for me, the first time I race electric and I am happy to help put my team on the podium. It is exciting to do something new and this weekend has been great fun.
RACE 1 - 3 Lap Sprint
11th August 2012
TTXGP and FIM press office
Matthias Himmelmann is the winner of today's three-lap race at Oschersleben in Germany. Aboard the latest model of the Münch TTE, he finished over twenty seconds ahead of former GP250 rider Katja Poensgen, also riding a Münch TTE. During the race, Matthias Himmelmann clocked up a best lap time of 1'38.481.
The Chinese Zongshen team confirmed its good performances in the practice session. Ho-Chi Fung, the fastest of the Zongshen Racing Team’s three riders, came in third just behind Katja Poensgen. However his faster laptime today of 1:46.683 is actually faster than Katja's production muench racer today; 1:46.683 which hints at what is to come in the future from this development chassis from Zongshen.
There were nine riders at the start of this Sprint that is part of the FIM e-Power International Championship and TTXGP Euro Championship 2012 series.
This three-lap Sprint specially organised at Oschersleben provided a showcase for the performances and top speeds of the motorcycles without the challenges of managing and conserving battery power that riders face in a classic race like the one taking place tomorrow, Sunday, at 12.50 hours over ten laps.
"I wasn’t going flat out," Matthias Himmelmann admitted after the race. "I didn’t have enough confidence in the front end during this race. We’ll have to fix that problem. I could have lapped a whole second faster."
Race one
1st place: Matthias Himmelman, no. 49 Muench Racing
I have to say I had a really great race with an exceptionally strong start, I was confident going into the race especially with such a great German crowd cheering on the team. They really help inspire us to do the best we can to put on a good show. The Sprint for me was a lot of fun because it allows everyone to to just race and not worry about battery management as they mst do for the longer race. I am happy so many of our sponsors where able to be here and share the experience. We have more than 100 guests celebrating in our teams hospitality unit and the atmosphere here at Oschersleben is great, we are really happy to have a first and second place today, but it will be even better when we have the whole podium tomorrow.
2nd place: Katya Poensgen No. 65 Muench Racing
It was fantastic racing in the sprint, it is so raw, I could just open the throttle and go. It was short; I was not sweating but it was a lot of fun. I will do my best to go faster tomorrow for the big race. My bike has a different engine that Matthias’s bike as I am on the production racer and he has a development motor. We also run a different type of battery pack on this bike to the development bike as this is totally enclosed so safer, but it means you have to be more careful with over-heating. I am confident for tomorrow and looking forward to representing Muench once again.
3rd place : Ho chi Fung; no.59 Zongshen
As a racer I don’t feel any different going into a sprint race or a longer distance one, I just want to go out there and win. The feeling is just the same. This race was great, I started from further back on the grid than I would have liked as we had some battery pack problems with the bike yesterday after the morning qualification where I was still learning the track. I only completed a few laps yesterday morning before we had some issues with the battery pack so I was forced to go slower than I had wanted to. We spent a lot of yesterday afternoon working hard on the pack, and missed the second qualifying session. Over night we have charged and discharged the new configuration; my team have worked really hard to give me the best possible bike for the race and everything seems to be holding ok. I am really optimistic about electric racing; I have only been eracing for a few years but have along history with my first love Petrol bikes, but my team is amazing and the pace at which the technology is developing I am confident it will not take them too long before they will be build me a bike that will go even faster the traditional petrol fuelled bikes.
I expected this new bike with a more powerful motor and better batteries to be faster; I had really high expectations and was really disappointed in Assen with all the problems we had been having but this was due to the lack of time to properly prepare and test the bike away from racing. The team are still getting to know this new bike but learning very fast. This morning I had a bit of traffic in front of me including my team mate Tang Yu; it actually took me over half a lap to get ahead of him as he was racing well. I got really close to Thomas in the second lap coming out of the chicane, but his bike is very powerful on the straights, I thought I would wait until the last corner to try again, and it worked for me. I got closer and closer and finally took over him on the right side on the last corner… I actually was disappointed though as I wanted to come second today, we felt we had the bike and racer to do this but with the traffic early on it was impossible to catch them all in just three laps., I need a little more time. We look forward to tomorrows race.
4th place: Thomas Schricht, no. 6 Muench racing
I am not sure exactly what happened because I have not had the time yet to examine the date from the bikes but I was so happy in the first lap, the bike was doing much better than yesterday and I had a great feeling about the race. I was actually trying to push the bike further and try to catch Katya but I made a small mistake in the chicane in lap twp and noticed that Ho Chi had come up really close. I then focused on making up the ground and in the last lap in the last corner, just when I need to keep maximum power, Ho Chi sailed passed me and my bike just didn’t give me the power I needed as it should have done.
Overall I had a great race, it was a lot of fun racing in a sprint, we have obviously meet with Zongshen on the track a number of times and they are always great to race against.
RACE ONE
pos
|
no.
|
rider
|
team (bike)
|
time
|
gap
|
best (lap)
|
| 1 |
49 |
Himmelman |
Muench (Muench TTE) |
5:02.397 |
|
1:38.481 (2) |
| 2 |
65 |
Poensgen |
Muench (Muench TTE) |
5:26.100 |
23.703 |
1:46.683 (3) |
| 3 |
59 |
Fung |
Zongshen (Zongshen) |
5:30.231 |
27.703 |
1:46.588 (3) |
| 4 |
6 |
Schricht |
Muench (Muench TTE) |
5:31.727 |
29.330 |
1:47.858 (2) |
| 5 |
25 |
Yu |
Zongshen (Zongshen) |
5:37.289 |
34.892 |
1.48.881 (2) |
| 6 |
36 |
Amendt |
Epo (Epobike) |
5:45.968 |
43.571 |
1.53.142 (2) |
| 7 |
72 |
Reichmann |
Reichmann Racing (mavizen TTX02) |
5:47.529 |
45.132 |
1:52.167 (3) |
| 8 |
64 |
Linden |
Zongshen (Zongshen) |
5:48.422 |
46.045 |
1:52.385 (3) |
| 9 |
91 |
Bergau |
Bergau Racing (mavizen TTX02) |
5:51.170 |
48.773 |
1:53.782 (3) |
Fastest lap
|
| |
49 |
Himmelman |
Muench |
|
|
138.481 (2) |
Harold Gasse did not qualify to take place in today's race.
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