Spampinato beats Meunier for victory at Kerlabo

Rallycross France had some welcome additions to the grid at Kerlabo, and among those returning to the competition, Olivier Spampinato prevailed with his Peugeot 208 WRX in an incredibly competitive field where Damien Meunier was his biggest threat to the win, while Philippe Maloigne celebrated a podium while debuting new machinery.
 

Those who had cars with agile change of direction had the upper hand in the Qualifying, with Olivier Spampinato dominating it despite not being a full time competitor, while Damien Meunier and Jonathan Pailler had similar pace and this ultimately led them to second and third in the table. Philippe Maloigne was debuting a Toyota Yaris WRX, literally a first for a car from the Japanese manufacturer in the supercar class, and the fourth place showed how fast and consistent the car was right away, having no difficulty to mix with the established models and their good number of years of service.
 
But not everybody had a reason to celebrate, as Fabien Pailler’s woes with the Renault Megane R.S. RX continue a week after the disaster that was the Euro RX round at Mondello Park, as Pailler had clear difficulties at the start, usually crawling his way to the finish until Q3, while the car didn’t take part of Q4, effectively putting him in last in the intermediate standings.
 
In the Semifinal B, Damien Meunier had to fight hard for the first place at the first corner as Stéphane de Ganay almost took the top spot. A costly slide at the Joker entry eliminated Anthony Paillardon’s Ford Fiesta RX with suspension damage, while the top 5 was more measured in the approach, as completing in one piece was more important than pushing hard and fight, with Meunier topping it with ease, while de Ganay was followed by Maloigne, Erwan Chapalain and Laurent Le Manac’h.
 
In the Semifinal A, David Vincent had a rocket start and outpaced Spampinato for the lead, and with the top 5 clearly detached from Knapick, there was no reason to force overtakes there, and to Vincent’s surprise, Jonathan Pailler pushed Spampinato so hard after the Joker that both were able to pass Vincent in the final corners, with Spampinato taking the win and Pailler following him, while Vincent had Derek Tohill on his back, who defended from Davy Jeanney to get his ticket to the Final.
 
Jonathan Pailler almost completed an outside overtake when the Final started, but Spampinato defended the inside and the lead by all means possible, throwing Pailler to fourth. Spampinato had Meunier close on his rear bumper until the fourth lap, when Meunier chose to Joker and almost fell behind Maloigne, but once he went to the Joker on Lap 5, Meunier resumed the attack on Spampinato, but without an opening to make a move, Meunier had to watch Spampinato take the win of the event. Behind them, Pailler took a five second penalty for track limits, meaning that Philippe Maloigne went to the podium on the debut of his new Toyota Yaris WRX.
 
Rallycross France - Kerlabo event results
 
Damien Meunier holds the lead with 122 points, with Davy Jeanney having 104 points and Derek Tohill having 98 in third. Next in the calendar is Lohéac, with the joint event with the FIA European Rallycross Championship and the 5 Nations British RX set for 30 August.
 
PHOTO: Rallycross France