> News
ATS Trophy Report (04/01/2007)
- By:
- Laurant
John Ermen reports on the ATS Trofeo
Last month new Serpent Team Netherlands signing John Ermen made his race debut with the Serpent 960 at the ATS Trofeo. The following is his account of the event on this beautiful new Italian circuit -
On the weekend of 9 and 10th of December the first ATS Trofeo was held on the beautiful track of Cassino, Italy which is situated about 150km south of Rome. We went there on Friday and the weather was pretty good. The sun was shining and it was about 16 – 18 degrees. So after we had a drink after our journey, we unpacked our gear and did some laps on the track. The track is not even a year old so everything looked really nice. Also the grip on the track was phenomenal!
On Friday I did some testing with my new car. Because this was my first race with the 960, I had to get used to it and the possible setups. At the end of the day I had a good feeling about the car and had a pretty good setup. I experimented with some shocks and the WOS steering blocks. The steering blocks especially good on the high speed track. It provided some more in corner steering. Also I tested some different body positions which resulted in a more stable car. At 17:00 it was beginning to get dark and we went back to the hotel for some rest.
The following morning it was raining. Heading to the track at about 10 o'clock it had stopped raining but the track was still wet. After the sun was shining for a couple of hours the track was still wet. Because of the asphalt, cold weather and lack of wind the track was still moist at 16:00, but we decided to do some laps anyway, because thats why we went over there…
On Sunday morning it was foggy but it hadn’t rained a drop overnight so we expected the track to be dry by now. But it was still wet. We asked Fabio for some intermediate rain tyres and started testing with some different tyres. After some tests and some setup changes I had a pretty good setup for the moist track conditions. In the first heat I was driving right behind Andrea Cristiani when after 5 or 6 laps, someone who I just overtaken, hit me in the rear which caused my tyre to rip. I had to change tyres and lost too much time. In the 2nd heat I was in 3rd position when after 2 minutes my battery broke down and I had to retire AGAIN. Unluckily there were only 2 series. So I didn’t had the time to qualify with a decent time.
After the lunch break I had to drive the C main. I leaded the race from start till finish with no problems what so ever. I had a 9 lap lead over the no. 2. I had even 4 laps more than the no. 1 in the B main. But unfortunately I had a bad qualifier.
When the A main was about to start the weather changed suddenly and it began to rain pretty hard. The start was postponed to give the drivers the chance to prepare their cars for the heavy rain conditions. Just after the start there were a lot of drivers who had some different troubles. Radio interference, engine problems and transmission problems. Andrea Cristiani was able to take the home win after a superb rain race with no problems what so ever. Congrats!
Besides of the weather and track conditions on Saturday and Sunday I am pretty happy with the results made with the 960. It is a very nice car to drive and I think it has a lot of potential! I’m already looking forward to the next race, I hope with some better track conditions..
See ya next time.
With best regards,
John Ermen
John Ermen debuted his new Serpent 960 in Italy
Silverware at the ATS Trofeo meeting at Cassino
News