Despite the heavy competition in the second event of the RallyX Nordic weekend at Kouvola, Johan Kristoffersson was back to supremacy again, as his win in Finnish soil followed a perfect weekend despite some trouble in between the sessions.
Kristoffersson stepped up his game compared to Saturday, and with him racing with decent gaps during all qualifying heats, he completed the Qualifying sweep with 3 wins out of 3, with Niclas Grönholm proving to be his main threat in second and Jere Kalliokoski keeping the good job in third.
Kristoffersson had the challenge from Kalliokoski at the start of the first Semifinal, but things went from bad to worse for the Finnish, losing the second position and then stopping in a crash. Ole Christian Veiby and Sondre Evjen were the guys immediately behind Kristoffersson, but with a consistent gap separating them, no one could get close of the KMS driver, whose Volkswagen Polo RX had a gearbox change before the session.
The Semifinal 2 had Grönholm and Gehrman in front and Bryntesson on their back bumpers, but Gehrman fell to the back of the field and found the barrier, and Bryntesson discovered how much Yury Belevskiy was up to a battle while Grönholm was in total command. The SET Promotion Hyundai remained in command while Belevskiy made a perfect defense to keep second place, consequently leaving Bryntesson in third.
A good launch was enough for Kristoffersson to keep the lead in the Final since he had the track position, but Grönholm was all over his rear bumper to try to find an opening. The minimal gap opened on Lap 3 was more than enough to keep Grönholm in second, but Kristoffersson had no time to rest since his tires appeared to have less grip than Grönholm’s, but it was this minimal pace advantage that gave Kristoffersson the win.
RallyX Nordic - Kouvola II event results
With three rounds to go, Kristoffersson is still with a good lead in the standings, having 113 points against the 94 from Grönholm, 75 from Evjen and 73 from Bryntesson. The next double header will be at Riga on 9-10 July, but with the World RX starting a week before and the second Euro RX1 round being on the same weekend at Höljes, there’s the possibility that even title contenders may miss the Latvian round.
PHOTO: Kristoffersson Motorsport
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