April 21, 2012
Published on tags: Superleague
With Midnight Motorsport coming off the high of a 1-2 finish at the previous round in Abu Dhabi, many expected the dominant pairing of Lukas Euler and Nick Rowland to achieve the same result in Hungary, the first of the European races on the calender. With the end of the flyaway races for the time being, the first European race often marks the start for many teams in terms of making significant upgrades to their cars, so while Midnight Motorsport were expected to dominate once again, many other teams had eyes aiming further up the grid and major improvement in form.

Qualifying told a familiar story, with Euler taking his fourth pole position in four races ahead of teammate Rowland. Joe Consiglio took 3rd, ahead of Dave Carr-Smith in 4th, filling in for Green Stripes Racing regular driver and team boss Christoph Lichtenstein. Pavel Loknovski took 5th, just threethousandths of a second ahead of Simon Cattell in 6th. Lee Morris had a troubled session and started down in 7th, ahead of Tanskanen, Clark, and Heesterbeek rounding out the top 10 for Nijo Racing.

Just a few seconds into the race, and there was controversy, with both Euler and Rowland having poor starts, 3rd place Consiglio had nowhere to go, and crashed into the back of Euler. Consiglio lost his front wing, and Euler suffered damage that required repairs instantly. With Rowland also having a poor start, incredibly it was Dave Carr-Smith who led the race after Lap 1, closely followed by Cattell, with Loknovski in 3rd.

Despite his poor start, and despite losing a front wing after a mid-race tangle with Scott Bennett whilst lapping the ST Racing driver, Nick Rowland kept his head and took home his second win in a row, showing incredible pace despite reporting a difficult handling car. Dave Carr-Smith had a very impressive drive to 2nd, exceeding all expectations in a car not expected to be anywhere near the front, and will certainly have put the pressure on Green Stripes Racing to let him drive for the rest of the season. An angry looking Lee Morris just snuck onto the podium with 3rd place, after an almost race long battle with Simon Cattell. The latter was involved in contact with Morris on the very last lap, and lost his front wing, and slipped down to 5th after a recovering Joe Consiglio took 4th away from him. The incident is sure to be investigated by the Disciplinary Committee. Lukas Euler had a very eventful race and finished in 6th, despite receiving a stop/go penalty after an incident involving Gavin Thomas, which saw the Welshman forced into retirement. Pavel Loknovski finished in 7th, ahead of Tanskanen 8th, Tom Parker 9th, and Heesterbeek taking home the final point in 10th place.

With another win under his belt, Rowland takes over the lead of the championship with 48 points, just 1 ahead of his teammate Euler, who has suffered 2 incident filled races after his opening race and Round 2 wins. Lee Morris is still well in the hunt with 40 points to his name in 3rd. Joe Consiglio is in 4th with 34 points. In the Constructors championship, Midnight appear untouchable, extending their lead to 47 points over nearest rivals Nordsjoen Racing. Draig Racing are in 3rd, with Red Archer and Kernow Sport rounding out the top 5. Carr-Smith's 2nd place finish sees Green Stripes Racing go from pointless, to 6th position in the championship.