Photo: STC2000

Facundo Ardusso clinches Super TC 2000 title in Córdoba

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Renault Sport’s Facundo Ardusso has won his first touring car title in Argentina after finishing second in the last Super TC 2000 feature race of 2017, a race won by Chevrolet YPF’s Agustín Canapino. Esteban Guerrieri of Citroën Total Racing completed the podium.

The front row had Ardusso joined by 2016 champion Canapino, who beat him off the line as the lights went out, leaving the Reanult driver in second place, protected by his team-mate Leonel Pernía in third place. Guerrieri remained fourth on the opening lap in his factory Citroën C4 Lounge, while the privateer Ford Focus of Damián Fineschi held fifth.

Behind the top drivers, Peugeot driver Mariano Werner, who was the only driver able to beat Ardusso to the title, was running in sixth, needing to move up to the lead to keep his title chances alive.

Werner fought hard in the beginning of the race and overtook Fineschi on the outside at turn two. The overtaking manoeuvre could have ended in tears as privateer driver Fineschi got into a slide and nearly took the Peugeot driver off track. Fineschi dropped to ninth as Werner moved up to fifth, but the Peugeot driver was over six seconds behind Canapino who was leading comfortably.

A very quiet race saw Canapino pulling away to two seconds on lap 18 over Ardusso.

Pernía had to pit with with a front-right tyre issue on lap 24, allowing Guerrieri to move up onto the podium and promoting Werner to fourth place.

No one could prevent Canapino from winning comfortably as Ardusso finished second and clinched the title, joined on the podium by Guerrieri. Werner finished fourth, followed by Matías Muñoz Marchesi, Facundo Conta and Damián Fineschi. Team Peugeot Total Argentina’s Fabián Yannantuoni, Chevrolet YPF’s Manuel Mallo and Facundo Chapur, in what was his final race for Team Peugeot Total Argentina, rounded off the top ten.

Renault ended a 23-year streak without winning a STC 2000 title as Ardusso, born June 24th 1988, won his first touring car title. He won the Formula Renault 2.0 Argentina championship in 2009 and raced for Toyota during the TC2000 era and Peugeot in both TC2000 and Super TC2000. The 29-year-old joined Renault Sport in 2016, clinching an emotional title on his second attempt for the French manufacturer.