India’s only Scirocco R-Cup driver this season, Sandeep Kumar, had yet another challenging weekend of racing. Oschersleben, Germany, was host to Races 7 and 8 of the Scirocco R-Cup 2013. In Race 7, Sandeep had a rather tough qualifying session, starting 21st on the grid and managed to finish 19th. Race 8 saw him come back and finished at a considerable 13th. Kasper H. Jensen had a wonderful weekend, starting with his first ever pole position, his first win (Race 7) and 3rd position in Race 8. Denise Trebing of USA clinched his first victory of the season in Race 8, starting 6th on the grid.
Sandeep had difficult start to the weekend with a qualifying position on 21st. He started off Race 7 with a lot of promise, reaching 12th position in the first lap itself but in doing so, he lost the crucial and limited push-to-pass feature. Late in the race he was forced to drop down places as other racers used their push-to-pass feature and Sandeep ended up finishing 19th. Race 8 saw only 18 cars on the grid with Sandeep starting at 16th position. This time he moved up the order progressively and finished at 13th position overall and 10th in the Junior Category.
Kelvin van der Linde (South Africa), currently leading the championship had a mixed weekend too. He finished 2nd in Race 7 and 15th in Race 8. After Race 8 he was very upset and was charged up for the last 2 races to claim the title. He blamed it on himself playing safe and not taking enough risk. He had come into contact with Mikaela Ahlin-Kottulinsky of Sweden and had got a drive-through penalty.
The Volkswagen Scirocco R-Cup title will only be decided in the season’s grand finale at the Hockenheimring on 19 October. Top-of-the-table Kelvin van der Linde (South Africa) was awarded a drive-through penalty during the second race in Oschersleben and only finished in 15th place. The 17-year-old is nevertheless in the lead after eight of the season’s nine races with 290 points, ahead of the Danish driver Kasper H. Jensen (247). The South African Jordan Lee Pepper (232) is also theoretically in the running for the title ahead of the last race. 60 points are awarded for each win.