European Hillclimb 2013

[Lousada]

Small update from me. I was at the Course de Côte de Sy in Belgium last weekend. Despite it being only a regional hillclimb quite a few 'national' drivers were there, like Yannick Bodson, Jacques Marchal and Bruno Collard.

The small town of Sy is located in the small valley of the Ourthe. The town is surrounded by high mountain ridges and is only accesible by car via one road. And that is the road the Hillclimb uses. You can park on the other side of the river and cross via the railroad bridge, or you can be dumb like me and park at the finish and walk the next 2.5km... Pretty amazingly the race starts right in the middle of the town. The spectator areas are hotels, bars, gardens and even a churchyard! There were a lot of people for Belgian standards and a special atmosphere. In my opinion it is one of the better Hillclimbs in Belgium.

Some photos can be found as expected on my website www.hillclimbportal.com

[eateel]

youtube.com/channel/UC-kRpu4Djuw8hxUt6vFYs4g?feature=watch

Apparently here's youtube official channel of Simone Faggioli, opened a few days ago.

[urabus-denoS2000]

In Croatia, news that multi time champion Siniša Krainc will not compete in the whole chanpionship with his monstruous Gabat-tuned Escort Cosworth, due to business obligations....

[mrsK]

Hi, have there been co-drivers in the past for Euro hillclimbs, and if so why no longer?

[A FONDO]

because this is sport for intelligent "players"

[mrsK]

because this is sport for intelligent "players"

thank you for responding. I'm not sure I understand your point. Do you mean to say that hillclimbs are short and an intelligent driver therefore memorizes the course eliminating the need for a co-driver?

[MrJan]

I think that's exactly what SlowSon meant. Certainly its the case in the UK. I'm in an event today where a run takes about 45 seconds and has 6 or 7 proper corners, if you need a co-driver for that then something is very wrong. Also a lot of the cars only have one seat anyway.

[MrJan]

Well that could have gone better. First off I took the bracket to fix the camera but forgot to take the camera, so no video. Secondly it took quite some getting used to being in a new car, I had a lot of trouble with gear changes and the brakes locking surprisingly easy.

A much better second event!! Although we didn't finish fixing the car until 10:30 on Friday night and were up at 6am the next morning to leave.

We were at Werrington Park this weekend, the first time that I've been there. So it wasn't very nice to arrive in the rain and then see that a tractor had driven on the top part of the hill and dropped a lot of mud. I took it quite easy on the first run, just hoping to make it to the top. I slowly got better through the day and was competing quite well in the class but, on my last run I had trouble off the line and then went from 2nd gear to 5th . I still finished with my best time of the day but it put me a long way down the class order.

Today was much better though, I felt much more confident and was making good improvments, running on similar times to the other car engined cars in the class(the bike engined are way too fast for us). Luckily (for me) the one guy in a fast bike engine crashed on his first timed run and failed to set a time, opeing up the class to a tight three way battle between me and two others. It was really close but I managed to come out on top. Most importantly though I didn't crash and I got quicker with every run.

Camera didn't work too well but managed to get a clip of my first practice.
[youtube]88tKdZgZc2A[/youtube]

[Jarek Z]

From what I can see the Polish Hillclimbing has quite a high level nowadays is it not?

I would say that for a poor country like Poland, the situation in hillclimbing is not bad.

[Lousada]

This weekend was the European Hill Race in Eschdorf, Luxembourg. It is part of the Luxembourg championship and also of the German Berg-Cup. It is perhaps considered as one of the biggest international hillclimbs that is not part of an international championship. The track is short but interesting, it has got fast flowing corners and slow hairpins. The organisation is professional and everything is well taken care off. I suppose if you could visit just one hillclimb a year, you might as well visit this one. You won't be disappointed.
There were many drivers present from all over Europe including even Pavel Dytko from Poland and Martin Kois from Slovakia. More than 150 drivers took the start this weekend. Sunday evening Marcel Steiner was allowed to climb the highest step of the podium, after he set a new trackrecord to defeat local hero David Hauser for the win. The full results can be seen as usual on my website.

I was present on Sunday and snapped some pictures.


Race winner Marcel Steiner in the Osella FA30 Zytek.


Pavel Dytko in the Peugeot 208 Proto. Apparently this car is based on a Mitsubishi Lancer technical platform. Sadly it broke down during the race.


Very nice Renault Laguna BTCC from the Wiebe family.


Simca CG Turbo of French driver Yannick Poinsignon. It did not compete in the topclass but was very quick nonetheless. It looks the part too, except for the non-existing deco.

More photos @ my website www.hillclimbportal.com