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Mira, Saturday July 4th- In Runabout GP1 Jeremy Perez took the holeshot, immediately establishing his dominance by achieving a best lap of 1:24.07 seconds. Robin Laforge was quickly overtaken from his second place start by Samuel Johansson and Pierre-François Savelli, who both took advantage of the Belgian’s slow start to push him down to fourth place.

Having secured an overtake early, Savelli got a taste for it and pushed aggressively for the second place spot, maintaining a distance of under two seconds for multiple laps, forcing former World Champion Johansson to bring his best. The Swede remained calm, however, unperturbed by the pressure from Savelli, finishing the race in second place and limiting Savelli to third. Their duel allowed Perez to extend his lead, far from any racing trouble, as he repeated his feat from last year and claimed victory in Moto 1. Meanwhile, racing on home turf did not bring any extra luck for Lino Araújo, who suffered engine problems on the sixth lap that forced an early end to his race. Mattias Siimann met the same fate on the twelfth lap, having run solidly in the middle of the racing pack until then.

Ski GP1

The indomitable Quinten Bossche took the holeshot, with Jeremy Poret soon behind him as the two riders overtook Jayden Richardson, who started in pole position. A slow start from Mickael Poret saw him pushed down to ninth from his fourth place start. As has so often been the case, once in the lead Bossche started flying ahead of the rest of the pack, establishing a lead of 7.91 seconds over Jeremy Poret by the second lap. Meanwhile Mickael Poret got straight to work regaining his position, overtaking current World Champion Oliver Koch Hansen on the third lap to move up to seventh place, and then overtaking Alec Enderli in the following lap.

Having had a brilliant opening day in Mira in which he secured pole position, Richardson’s day took a turn for the worse as he faced mechanical issues that made him tumble down the rankings on the sixth lap, ultimately ending his day early. Apart from Richardson’s fall, the top of the pack remained frozen for the latter half of the race. Bossche’s dominance saw him finish 17.25 seconds ahead of second-placed Jeremy Poret, with Valentin Dardillat coming in third place, Felix Helgeson in fourth place, and Mickael Poret managed to claw back to finish in fifth place.

Ski Ladies GP1

Last year, Benedicte Drange got a clean sweep in Mira, winning all three Motos to secure the full 75 points. Starting in second place, a repeat looked possible, until her bike failed to take off at the start of the race, costing the Norwegian valuable seconds and seeing her pushed back into ninth place. Estelle Poret kept her place at the front, and promptly secured a best lap of 1:41.39 seconds, whilst Jessica Chavanne profited from Drange’s misfortune to move up to second place.

The pressure was now on Drange to move back to the top of the pack, which she started to do immediately, overtaking Héloise Delcluze on the second lap and then setting her sights on Lou Dardillat shortly after. Dardillat put up a valiant fight, holding off an aggressive Drange for two laps, but ultimately the Dane’s pace proved too great, and Drange moved up to seventh place on the sixth lap. It took Drange until the last lap to gain another position, moving up to sixth place after overtaking Virginie Morlaes. Meanwhile, Chavanne managed to stay only a few seconds behind Poret for the entirety of the race, keeping the pressure on the current World Champion, but Poret kept her cool and crossed the finish line 3.80 seconds ahead of second-place Chavanne.

Ski GP2

Robin Sylvester took the holeshot in Ski GP2 to hold onto his pole position start, as Karl Joosep Steinberg gained a position from Daan Hoeke to move into second place. Sylvester then put down a flying first lap that was 2.76 seconds quicker than any other rider, helping him to extend his lead at the front from the very start of the race. 

The race remained stable until the very final lap, when Steinberg fell off his bike just ahead of the finish line, allowing Daan Hoeke to retake the second place position in which he started the race, and keep his hopes of retaining the race win he achieved in Mira last year alive as he claimed 22 points. Hoeke will have a serious challenge on his hands though, as Sylvester proved himself a class apart in Moto 1, comfortably crossing the finish line 15.88 seconds ahead of anyone else.

Runabout GP2

Stefano Castronovo delivered a mesmerising opening to the Runabout GP2 race, as he wrestled his way from sixteenth to third at the start, before fellow Italian Manuel Reggiani took back his third place position on the second lap. The Estonian duo of Mattias Siimann and Karl Keskula retained their leading positions in first and second place respectively, and once Reggiani regained third place from Castronovo, the top three returned to what it had been at the start. Siimann had initially been flying at the front achieving the race’s best lap of 1:36.01 seconds on his first lap, but that lead suddenly fell away after he encountered issues on the third lap and he fell back into fourth place.

The Estonian immediately began fighting to regain his place at the top, overtaking Romain Bardoux on the fifth lap to go into third, then setting his sights on second-place Reggiani, with just 1.67 seconds separating the two by the seventh lap. But rather than looking over his shoulder, Reggiani was firmly fixed on the rider in front of him, overtaking Keskula in the eighth lap to take the lead, and setting up an epically tight showdown as the top three riders entered the final lap with just 1.78 seconds separating them.

The final lap proved the most dramatic, as Siimann trounced both Keskula and then Reggiani to shoot back into first place, where he had started the race, but only after having gone straight over a course buoy. Reggiani therefore crossed the finish line second, and despite having led for most of the race, Keskula crossed it in third, but both riders were bumped up by a position apiece after Siimann was docked a lap for his infringement, with the Estonian ending up fourteenth in the final Moto 1 standings.

Runabout GP4 Junior 

It was plain sailing for Jose Vainio in Runabout GP4 Junior, as the young Finn led from start to finish to claim the Moto 1 win. David Dvorak initially put some pressure on the race leader, claiming the fastest first lap of the race, before Vainio stepped up a gear on the second lap.

Dvorak kept the pressure on Vainio, achieving the race’s best lap of 1:49.29 seconds on his fifth lap as he closed the gap on the race leader. But the gap proved too great to close for Dvorak, who had to settle for second place behind first-placed Vainio.