PSRX Canada Review
A superb Sunday of racing Saw Johan Take the top spot on the Podium for the Sixth time this season. Not a bad achievement when you consider that there have only been seven race weekends. Despite being well down the leaderboard after day 1 following a great battle with Andreas Bakkerud of Team EKS Audi Sport, which made for great viewing, but not so great times for the two drivers. Johan then took 7th in Q2, after getting caught in the middle of the racing field, which held him up significantly.
This was in contrast to his teammate. Petter was in great form through Q1 and Q2 finishing third in each session, which left him in P3 overnight, as well as setting a new lap record of 46.959s. Don’t think that it was easy for Petter though, he had great battles at the front of the pack with some exciting and nervy moments throughout.
Onto Sunday, and Johan managed to find the Pace which had eluded him on Saturday. He won Q3, then also won Q4 to launch himself to the top of the leader board, and put him in P1 for the semi-finals. Petter was as consistent as ever, and with a slight blip in Q3 seeing him take 5th place, followed by a 3rd place in Q4, he was back to P3 overall heading in to the Semis.
The Semis were closely fought With Petter and Johan both racing in Semi Final 1, it became a nervous time for the team. The drivers are competitive, and that is in their nature, but there have already been a couple of incidents this season, where they sometimes get a little too close, not through anyone’s fault, it is just the nature of the sport. The Semi Final went well, Johan got the win, and Petter got third, so both drivers advance to the final. There’s very little time between the semis and the final race, so it is all hands on deck to check the cars over and have them back on track ready for the main event of the day. This is the one everyone has come to see. Johan gets a great launch off the line, makes it into turn 1 ahead of the chasing pack, and from there on, it never looked in doubt. He held on to the lead all the way to the chequered flag while the rest of the drivers battled it out for the remaining steps on the podium. In the end a late charge from Timmy Hansen, saw him take second, with Sebastien Loeb taking the final step on the podium. With Petter finishing in 5th place after running wide on the joker lap, and then getting caught in traffic, he was never able to make up the time despite the blistering speeds the Polos were able to achieve, hitting the fastest speeds of any track this season, with top speeds of around 125 MPH.
Another successful race weekend for Team PSRX with Johan extending his lead at the top of the championship, as well as the team increasing their lead at the top of the team standings. Giving them a healthy lead heading into round 8 in France.
When asked about his resurgence on Sunday, Johan responded with “But you know, that’s where having a team mate like Petter Solberg really comes good. I felt I was sections, so I sat down with my team-mate, and we talked through everything in the car and in the driving. He helped me and on Sunday morning I did what he told me, came off the beach and back to the races.”
This shows the camaraderie between the drivers, and it is great to see. Even though they are battling against each other, they win and lose as a team, not just as individuals, and are willing to help each other understand where they can find those small margins to improve, where hundredths of a second can be the difference between winning and losing.
Petter had this to say of the weekend “Fantastic weekend for PSRX Volswagen Sweden. Fantastic. But... I’ve got to admit, I do feel a little bit frustrated with this weekend. I felt I could have come away from Canada with a little bit more. But the big thing is the performance of the team and, of course Johan. It was a great job.”
All in all, A great weekend for the team, and makes us extremely proud to be associated with the team, and every time we see them use AMDetails products on the cars, it still blows our minds. Even at an event like RX Canada where they have to fly out the essentials for the weekend, and you see Andrew Coley doing his pit walk, and there we are. APC, Dress, And detailer are right there ready to use. Check out the video here
Stay tuned for our review of the next round in France.
