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Sweden’s Johan Kristoffersson was quickest in Q2 at the 7th round of the FIA World Rallycross Championship at Holjes in Sweden, leading the last race of the session from the front. 

Adding his quickest time in Q2 to second quickest in Q1, Kristoffersson is TQ (top qualifier) at the end of day one.

“It’s never easy. In Q1 I was very wide in the first corner, but from there I managed to get onto the track again and catch up to Oliver Eriksson and overtook him." He said

"We had good speed, so it was a good time,” he said. “In Q2 I started side-by-side with Sebastien (Loeb) and was able to be first into the first corner. From there I really enjoyed every second of the race."

"To be able to have a very good car, pushing flat out not thinking about tyres and just going for it on the best track in the world, in front of all the passionate fans here and of course my home event, it was a bit special!" Concluded Kristoffersson

Kevin Eriksson won Q2 race four and was second quickest, with Norway’s Andreas Bakkerud third for the second session in a row and holds the same position in the Intermediate Classification.

Sweden’s Timmy Hansen finished second to Eriksson in his Q2 race and was fourth, France’s Sebastien Loeb was fifth and Norway’s Petter Solberg sixth. At the end of the first day of action, America’s Ken Block is seventh and Finland’s Niclas Gonholm is eighth in the Intermediate Classification. 

In the FIA European Rallycross Championship for Supercar, Sweden’s Robin Larsson was quickest in Q2 ahead of Norway’s Thomas Bryntesson and Sweden’s Peter Hedstrom. Bryntesson is TQ on day one. 

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Sweden’s Johan Kristoffersson took a heroic victory at Team Verksted World RX of Norway, round six of the World Rallycross Championship presented by Monster Energy – his win made even more impressive considering the PSRX Volkswagen Sweden racer was driving with a badly injured right foot. Kristoffersson’s second victory of the year has extended the Swede’s lead in the overall driver standings - he is now eight points ahead of Mattias Ekstrom [EKS] who finished fourth this weekend.
 
Hoonigan Racing Division’s Andreas Bakkerud finished runner-up in front of an elated home crowd, while Frenchman Sebastien Loeb took the third podium spot at the wheel of his Peugeot 208 WRX Supercar.  Petter Solberg won the fourth qualifying session but missed out on the final after finishing fourth in his semi-final. Solberg finished Hell RX seventh overall and remains third in the driver standings, 17 points adrift of his team-mate and series leader Kristoffersson.  PSRX Volkswagen Sweden continue to dominate the teams’ standings – 81 points clear of second-placed Team Peugeot-Hansen.

In the FIA European Rallycross Championship presented by Monster Energy, (Euro RX), where Norway marked the second of five rounds, it was former World RX driver Robin Larsson who took the chequered flag first. Anton Marklund and Alexander Hvaal were second and third respectively.  Hungary’s Tamas Pal Kiss crossed the line in second place but was demoted to fifth after incurring a five second penalty for causing a collision and impeding another driver [Marklund] in the final.  Marklund tops the Euro RX leaderboard – 12 points ahead of Larsson.
 
“I have to thank my team and car – this is another really good result for us,” enthused event winner Kristoffersson, visibly in pain when he stepped out of the car following today’s final.  The Swede took up the story: “In pre-grid on Friday, there was an unfortunate accident as my right foot got caught underneath Sebastien’s [Loeb] car. It needed to be reversed to get my foot back out which was really painful but nobody’s fault, just one of those things that happened.  As there wasn’t much time between the semi-final and final, that is when it was really bad but painkillers helped and I will go to the hospital tomorrow morning to get it properly looked at.”
 
When asked about his driving performance, Kristoffersson remarked: “In the dry, we were very quick this weekend. We tested here recently and we had a good idea about the set-up but it started to rain during practice and I couldn’t get the launches right.  Today felt much better but then I had a puncture in Q4. In the final, I had the best launch all weekend and managed to get ahead of Andreas so I tried to close him off. From there, the car was working perfectly and I felt I was really flying so I’m very happy. I’m driving in the STCC next week and after that it’s Holjes – my home event hasn’t gone so well for me in the past but we’ll see how this year goes.”
 
Second-placed Bakkerud had the fastest reaction off the line in today’s final and was awarded the Monster Energy Super Charge Award.  The Norwegian led for the first lap but Kristoffersson took charge after Bakkerud opted for a lap two joker lap. Bakkerud explained: “Johan was quicker than me in the final – I took my Joker on the second lap but went wide in the first corner so I lost some crucial time and Johan got out ahead. All credit to Johan as he won fair and square. I have to admit that it’s my home event and we always want to do well here – as a Norwegian, you don’t want to have a Swedish flag on the top but a podium is always a great result. Generally, I am really happy with the car – I could have had a better launch and given more of a fight but we have to be happy with P2.”
 
Third-placed Loeb added: “We didn’t have the speed of the top two today [Kristoffersson and Bakkerud] this weekend so I am very satisfied with P3.  We had engine trouble in practice so we had to change the engine and then we were fifth overall going into the semi-finals. I had a very good start in my semi-final so I tried my best to push and finished second which put me on the second row of the final. I had an excellent launch in the final – better than [Mattias] Ekstrom and I managed to close the door on him at the end of the straight. I had a very good run but couldn’t quite reach the pace of the top two.  We need to improve the agility of the car which is something we are working on.”
 
Sweden’s Timmy Hansen made today’s final despite qualifying only 12th at the Intermediate stage in his Peugeot 208 WRX Supercar following an incident in Q3. Hansen made a remarkable comeback in Q4 to qualify on the back row of the semi-final and went on to finish fifth overall for Team Peugeot-Hansen.  Sixth place was taken by STARD’s Timur Timerzyanov – the best result for the Russian so far this year in his Ford Fiesta RXS Supercar.

Elsewhere, Hoonigan Racing Division’s Ken Block was eighth after a solid weekend in the Ford Focus RS RX Supercar – one spot ahead of Kevin Hansen who finished ninth after graduating from High School last week.  Rounding out the top ten was Latvia’s Reinis Nitiss [EKS].

In the third round of the highly-competitive RX2 International Series presented by Cooper Tires, it was Frenchman Cyril Raymond who took his third win in a row.  America’s Tanner Whitten was second, while Britain’s Dan Rooke – who celebrated his 20th birthday last week – rounded out the top three.  Raymond leads Rooke in the overall RX2 driver standings by eight points.

In the FIA European Rallycross Championship for TouringCar, where Norway marked the penultimate round, it was Lars-Oivind Enerberg who took the win and extended his lead at the top of the standings. Philip Gehrman and Fredrik Magnussen were second and third respectively.
 
Paul Bellamy, World RX Managing Director for IMG, concluded: “We had a record crowd of over 21,000 people this weekend in Norway which is testament to the sterling effort from the Hell RX organisers.  It was also an honour to have the Mayor of Stjordal Ivar Vigdenes, with us this weekend and the support from the Norwegian crowd for home drivers Petter Solberg and Andreas Bakkerud is always spectacular; with 320 fans attending as part of the Bakkerud Blue fan club alone. Congratulations to Johan for his second win of the year – to win in World RX is certainly not easy but to do it with an injured foot is nothing short of remarkable.  Well done to Andreas for taking runner-up in front of the home crowd and it’s fantastic to see Peugeot back on the podium with Sebastien Loeb.”

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The seventh round of the FIA World Rallycross Championship will take place at the iconic Holjes rallycross circuit in Sweden this weekend (30 June-2 July).  A bumper entry of more than 100 cars have entered the Swedish round of World RX which includes 53 Supercars (22 World RX; 35 Euro RX), an over-subscribed class of 30 Super1600 cars and 24 RX2 entries. It is the biggest entry of the 2017 season so far.

Set in the small village of Holjes in the heart of the Varmland region, rallycross is well established in Sweden – it was the first of the Nordic countries to embrace rallycross, and remains the only country to have hosted an event in the European/FIA Championship since it began in 1973. 

Sweden’s Johan Kristoffersson [PSRX Volkswagen Sweden] currently leads the driver standings and will attend his home round of the World Championship with an eight-point lead over Mattias Ekstrom.  Ekstrom, however, has been forced to skip Swecon World RX of Sweden due to DTM commitments and Kristoffersson will be looking to capitalise on this in order to extend his series lead even further.

PG Andersson will step in for Ekstrom at Holjes RX but Reinis Nitiss and Toomas Heikkinen will act as nominated team point-scorers for EKS at the event.  Andersson, a former WRC driver, is no stranger to rallycross having contested ten World RX rounds with Marklund Motorsport in 2015.

Andersson explained: “When Mattias called me I didn’t think twice. The opportunity to sit in his car again and to compete against the world’s best rallycross campaigners is an honour for me, especially in Holjes of all places. I can’t wait to do my first laps in Friday’s free practice.”

Former World RX Teams’ Champions Olsbergs MSE will enter a pair of Ford Fiesta Supercars for Swedish duo Sebastien Eriksson and Oliver Eriksson – the latter the younger brother of permanent World RX driver, Kevin Eriksson. France’s Herve Knapick will race a Citroen DS3 and Finland’s Joni-Pekka Rajala will make this third ever World RX start in a Mitsubishi Mirage. 

Thirty-five drivers have entered the third round of the FIA European Rallycross Championship (Euro RX) for Supercar in Holjes. In addition to the regular competitors, Belgium’s Jochen Coox will race a Volkswagen Polo, Finland’s Ari-Pekka Niemi will drive an ex-Niclas Gronholm Olsbergs MSE Ford Fiesta Supercar. Furthermore, Euro RX TouringCar title-contender Philip Gehrman will make his Supercar debut in an Eklund Motorsport Volkswagen Beetle. 

Competitors in the FIA European Rallycross Championship for Super1600 will race in the third round of the front-wheel drive class, led by series leader, Lithuania’s Kasparas Navickas. Thirty drivers will take part including Latvian team TT Motorsport, which will field a pair of debutant Latvian drivers, Arnis Odins and Juris Spikis in Renault Twingos. 

The RX2 International Series presented by Cooper Tires will also be in action in Holjes for its fourth round and the entry list includes a record-breaking 24 drivers.  Defending Champion Cyril Raymond remains unbeaten but with Britain’s Dan Rooke and America’s Tanner’s Whitten both regular podium finishers, Raymond will need to put on another strong showing to score another win. With a total of 13 Swedes and five Norwegians, there will be no shortage of Scandinavians eager to pick up silverware on home soil.

Paul Bellamy, World RX Managing Director for IMG, concluded: “Holjes is the jewel in our rallycross crown and the event that all drivers want to win.  Mattias [Ekstrom] won in 2014 and 2015 but Andreas [Bakkerud] triumphed last year so it will be interesting to see if we can produce a third Holjes RX winner at the magic weekend which attracts tens of thousands of fans each year. The Holjes track is one of the most popular circuits of the year thanks to a layout with features super-quick corners, banked turns and also a jump that can see cars travel as far as 40 metres in the air. With so many local drivers and over 100 entries, the competition will be fierce meaning the smallest of errors in qualifying could cost the teams a spot in the semi-finals.”

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Norway’s Andreas Bakkerud set the fastest time in Q2 at the World RX of Norway, round six of the FIA World Rallycross Championship presented by Monster Energy, but it’s Championship leader Mattias Ekstrom who is TQ (Top Qualifier) on Saturday in Hell.

Bakkerud made the best start with his Ford Focus RS RX in the last race of the day and immediately took his joker lap, passing Ekstrom, Petter Solberg and Johan Kristoffersson when the others took their jokers to win the race and set the fastest time at his home event, where he claimed an unprecedented ‘clean sweep’ last season.

“I enjoyed Q2 so much, the track changed so much between Q1 and Q2, so I was lucky that I went to the joker in the first lap. I could kind of see where the others were struggling, so that helped me. It felt good, I was catching a bit every lap and when the twoin front took the joker I could take the win,” explained Bakkerud. 

MJP Racing Team Austria’s Kevin Eriksson won the first race of Q2 and was fourth at the finish, behind Bakkerud, Ekstrom and Solberg and is currently just outside the semi-final qualifying positions in 14th ahead of Q3 tomorrow morning. Bakkerud’s time in Q2 lifted him to second overall, with Solberg in third, Kristoffersson (who was ninth in Q2 after racing against Solberg) fourth, Sebastien Loeb fifth and Timmy Hansen sixth. 

Sweden’s Robin Larsson was fastest in Q2 of Euro RX ahead of Norway’s Thomas Bryntesson and Germany’s Mandie August. After four qualifying heads in RX2 and TouringCar, Championship leaders Cyril Raymond and Lars-Oivind Enerberg are Top Qualifiers at the Intermediate Classifications. 

 

         

 

 

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