Photo: Jacques Letihon Photographe

Mathieu Detry wins Sprint 1 at Zolder ahead of the title contenders

Mathieu Detry followed up on Team WRT’s first win of the season yesterday with the #7 SEAT of Sam Dejonghe and Denis Dupont, with victory in the first sprint race on Sunday, leading the Delahaye Volkswagen of Guillaume Mondron and the Boutsen Ginion Honda of Stéphane Lémeret across the finish line.

DK Racing’s Jonas de Kimpe started from pole position, but the Volkswagen driver stalled at the start, giving the Volkswagen of Detry an easy run to take the lead at Turn 1, with Dupont moving up to second in the sister WRT SEAT.

Dupont’s race ended a lap later however with an engine issue, with the Belgian stopping on circuit and was towed back for repairs, promoting title hopeful Mondron to second, with Lémeret now up to third after starting seventh on the grid.

Detry and Mondron battled for the lead during the last half of the race, while Lémeret was a few seconds behind in the orange Honda Civic.

Kevin Abbring had moved from eighth to fourth in the DG Sport Compétition Peugeot 308, and was fighting to keep back Stan van Oord’s Bas Koeten Audi during the final laps of the race, with van Oord’s team-mate Willem Meijer just a few seconds further behind.

Jonas de Kimpe had a lonely run to seventh following his stall, with Dupont not classified.

Mondron now trails Benjamin Lessennes in the standings by just nine points, with Detry and co-driver Maxime Potty just three points behind the absent Tom Coronel for third.

Race 2 follows imminently with the grid as per Race 1’s result.