Maslennikov wins the second race at Moscow Raceway
In the second race at Moscow raceway, Andrej Maslennikov took his first win in the 2021 TCR Russia. Zakhar Slutskiy and Ivan Lukashevich filled the other podium positions, but the main fact as far as the title fight is concerned was Dmitry Bragin’s retirement on the penultimate lap while he was in second position.
This meant that, despite a poor performance of the LADA Vesta cars, Kirill Ladygin was classified eighth and stretched his leadership in the standings to 31 points over Maslennikov, while Race 1 winner Pavel Kalmanovich moved to third one further point adrift and Bragin dropped to fourth, 35 points off the leader.
Mikhail Mityaev from the pole tried to keep Maslennikov at bay by pushing him against the pit wall, but the Lukoil driver kept the line and led into Turn 1, while Bragin benefited from the situation and moved into P2 ahead of Mityaev and Ladygin.
During the first lap Lev Tolkachev went off and remained stuck onto the gravel, while Slutskiy passed Egor Fokin for P5.
The safety car was deployed in lap 2, for recovering Tolkachev’s car; when racing resumed, Bragin was chasing Maslennikov. Behind them the LADA Sport cars looked in troubles; Ladygin dropped from fourth to eighth, while Mityaev struggled to defend the third position. In lap 6, Slutskiy, Fokin and Lukashevich overtook Mityaev climbing to third, fourth and fifth respectively. Ladygin continued to lose positions and dropped to 11th.
In lap 8, a Super Production car caught fire; it was quickly extinguished, but the safety car was deployed once again while the marshals were cleaning the track.
The green flag was waved in lap 11 and two laps later Lukashevich passed Fokin for P4; up front Maslennikov pulled away, while Bragin and Slutskiy had a close fight for P2 and swapped the positions a couple of times.
Mityaev began to drop, in order to help his teammate Ladygin to advance a few places and defend his leadership in the championship, but then during the penultimate lap Bragin slowed down and stopped with a technical issue.
The next event will be on September 11/12 at Kazan Ring.
Moscow Raceway – Race 2
1. Andrej Maslennikov (Lukoil Racing Team, Hyundai i30 N), 16 laps
2. Zakhar Slutskiy (Carville Racing, Hyundai i30 N), 2.046
3. Ivan Lukashevich (Lukoil Racing Team, Hyundai i30 N), 4.219
4. Egor Fokin (A.M.G. Motorsport, LADA Vesta Sport), 5.130
5. Pavel Kalmanovich (AG Team, CUPRA), 5.580
Championship points:
1. K. Ladygin 140 pts; 2. A. Maslennikov 109; 3. P. Kalmanovich 108
Picture: Grigory Golyshev
