Engine problem puts an end to “Aurum 1006km” race

22.07.2020

Last week from 15 to 18 July one of the biggest motorsports’ competitions in the Baltic region – “Aurum 1006 km Powered by Hankook” took place in Palanga, Lithuania. Drivers were competing in drift, drag race disciplines, and in the main race of the weekend – endurance race, where drivers had to finish a distance of 1006 km. 28 cars on the start grid – Porsche, Lamborghini, BMW, VW TCR, Seat TCR, and even one Lada 2104 with very powerful engine, and other impressive cars. Overall 105 drivers took part from countries like Lithuania, Estonia, Germany, and the United Kingdom. More information about the race you can find here – https://racing.lt/en.

The only participant from Latvia was a 19-year-old Valters Zviedris, who joined the Lithuanian team “DHL/Čapkauskas Racing” that last year won the champion’s title at the Baltic and North-Europan zone championship. This time in the team Valters had drivers younger than him – Titas Čapkauskas, 18-year-old son of the team manager Ramūnas Čapkauskas, talanted and only 17-years- old Henrikas Matijošaitis, who has an experience in the rally, and the experienced Audrius Stasiulevičius. Cupra TCR-DSG was in their hands for the race. Overall, these four popular cars were participating in the TCR class  – two Cupra’s and two VW Golf TCR-SEQ.

Thursday was a training day, where Valters already proved his speed among his teammates, and was one second faster than Henrikas Matijošaitis, and two seconds faster than the rest two teammates. During the endurance races, a certain competition exists inside the team, because everyone drives the same car, meaning – who is fastest in the training sessions gets the chance to drive in qualification and also be on a start grid and begin the race. In both trainings and qualification Valters showed stable Top 10 lap times in the overall competition, and was fighting for the 2nd place in the TCR class, as the “Noker Team” with the TCR Golf car with a sequential gear shift was one second faster than us. Qualification ended in the 10th place, that gave Valters a fifth row on the start. He successfully started the race and held his first one-hour shift, or as it is called in the endurance race – a stint. Also the rest teammates held a good pace, and the team was holding the 10th-12th place among 28 other teams, and was fighting for the 2nd-3rd place in the TCR class with “Lesta Racing Team” and “Sauda by GSR” teams.

Unfortunately, at the end of the 4th hour, when Titas Čapkauskas was behind the wheel, the engine of our team’s Cupra suddenly broke, and this put an end to the race. A big disappointment was on Valter’s face, because he was already dressed up and fully ready for this second stint, and even got into the car and fastened the seat belts to continue the race, but then the mechanics shared the sad news that the engine is irreparable and the race has ended for our team.

Right now all the blues are over, and Valters already managed to participate in a digital race with Formula 4 in the Finnish digital cup. The race took place in Botniaring race track, where among 12 drivers Valters gained 4th and 5th places. This week in Parnu we will join the recurring tests with Audi RS3 LMS TCR with a goal to be better prepared for the first round of the NEZ 6h race, that will take place in this same auto24ring.ee race track in Estonia. As for the next year, we will try to go back to Palanga in order to rehabilitate the bad luck we had this year!

This year Valters plans to take part in the two NEZ6H endurance races in Parnu and Riga, and also in Finnish and NEZ championships with Legend cars. The first round that was planned in 1 August in the newly opened Kymi Ring near Kuovala city was cancelled due to the current Covid-19 restrictions in Finland. Therefore the first round is planned to take place on 22-23 August in Botniaring near Jurva at the north of Finland.

Valters and his team expresses thanks to Jurmala City Council for sponsoring participation costs for many years, and to other supporters – SIA “Optibet”, “Laimz.lv”, “Gatorz Eyewear Europe”, “Joker Klubs”, ”I-Con”, “KDM Print”, “Rosenso Marketing”, “2BCreative”, “IAuto.lv” and others.