Markus Schlosser and Luca Schmidt held a 13-point lead in the FIM Sidecar World Championship standings when they traveled to Hungary for the third round of the season. Saturday’s sprint race was a complete disaster for the Swiss-German duo. Defending champions Harry Payne and Kevin Rousseau seized the lead.
Payne and Rousseau of the German team Steinhausen Racing secured pole position at the Pannoniaring, laying the groundwork for their eventual victory. Sam and Tim Christie (Hanafin Racing) started from second place. Von Schlosser and Schmidt (Team Schlosser) were nowhere to be seen at the front. They failed to find their rhythm in the decisive second qualifying session and could only manage seventh place.
It wasn’t Payne but Christie who won the start, and he briefly took the lead. But the defending champions didn’t let that last long. They quickly overtook the British brothers. There was a lot of jostling, and Schlosser was involved as well. “In the second left-hand turn, Todd Ellis squeezed in and pushed us way wide,” recounts his German passenger from the racing town of Schleiz. The 21-year-old vice world champion continues: “Because everything had backed up, another sidecar team really slammed into our rear wheel. Not only did it lose air, but it spun on the rim for half a lap. Markus thought we had a flat, but the air didn’t go out completely. At first, the tire was slipping like crazy and we had little grip. By then, the gap to the front was too big for us to stay in contention.”
In the end, Schlosser finished fifth after seven laps, following a thrilling battle with Tim Reeves and Kevin Kölsch (Carl Cox Motorsport). They couldn’t have done any better, yet Schlosser and Schmidt still lost the championship lead to Payne and Rousseau. The margin: a single point.
Payne set the fastest lap time of 1:56.084 minutes on the fifth lap, thereby holding off Sam Christie/Tom Christie, Pekka Päivärinta/Adam Christie (Hänni Racing), and Todd Ellis/Emmanuelle Clément. They had been within striking distance up to that point. In the eighth of nine laps, the race was red-flagged. Patrick Werkstätter/Valentin Pirat (Sattler Motorsport) had rolled their car. The Germans Lennard Göttlich/Lucas Krieg (Team Lausitz/ADAC Sachsen) were also plagued by bad luck: engine failure. It was already the third such incident this year for the team with start number “42.”
The race was decided after seven laps. The winners were Harry Payne and Kevin Rousseau. At the award ceremony, the British-French duo’s sunglasses were already gleaming with gold-tinted lenses.
Results of the FIM Sidecar World Championship, Sprint Race
1. Harry Payne/Kevin Rousseau (GB/F), ARS Yamaha
2. Sam Christie/Tom Christie (GB), LCR Yamaha
3. Pekka Päivärinta/Adam Christie (FIN/GB), ARS Yamaha
4. Todd Ellis/Emmanuelle Clément (GB/F), LCR Yamaha
5. Markus Schlosser/Luca Schmidt (CH/D), LCR Yamaha
6. Tim Reeves/Kevin Kölsch (GB/D), ARS Yamaha
7. Paul Leglise/Marjorie Cescutti (F), LCR Yamaha
8. Rupert Archer/Ondrej Sedlacek (GB/CZ), ARS Yamaha
9. Markus Venus/Thomas Hofer (D/CH), LCR Yamaha
10.Joni Manninen/Tero Manninen (FIN), LCR Yamaha
11.Kevin Cable/Charlie Richardson (GB), LCR Yamaha