Hoppe Wins German Nationals

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Tyler Hooks

0 Sept. 17, 2018, 11:43 a.m.

By Tyler Hooks
LiveRC.com

Race Report from Team Shepherd:
www.team-shepherd.com

Last weekend the German nationals were held at the beautiful Minidrom Ettlingen track in the South of the country. For Team Shepherd it was a very successfull weekend claiming four German champion titles overall including the precious title in the expert class.

With Lars Hoppe, Maxi Vogl and Timo Schröder it were 3 Shepherd drivers in the 45min expert main final. The crowd at the track saw an very exciting final as it was a close battle for the victory between Lars Hoppe and Oliver Mack from the beginning of the race as pole-setter Toni Gruber suffered engine problems. Due to different fuel and tyre strategies the lead swapped numerous time during the final. Lars opted to change only the outside tyres at the third pitstop while Oliver changed all four tyres in the middle of the race. Before the final round of pitstops Oliver took over the lead with fresher tyres but Lars stayed behind closely. Lars entered the pits for his last stop first and a super fast pitstop of Thilo Tödtmann put some pressure on team Mack. A few laps later Oliver had his last pitstop and he returned to the track just behind Lars. For the final laps the distance was only a few meters but Lars put his head down and crossed the finishing line in first position to take his maiden German Championship title.

In the class 2 it was young David Kröger with a great drive in the final after winning the semi-final with a gap of 4 laps over the rest of the field. A small mistake in the first lap of the main final dropped him to the last position but for the rest of the race he showed a flawless performance. A few minutes before the end of the race David took over the lead and never looked back to take the German Championship title class 2 as well as the Junior Champion title. Shepherd teammate Christian Willert finished the race in 6th position to take the 40+ Champion title class 2.

Big thanks go also to the MC Ettlingen club that did their very best to improve the tyre situation for the finals day.