Photo: TouringCarTimes

“Dangerous” Assen sausage kerbs removed after incidents

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Several sausage kerbs have been removed and replaced with tyre stacks for the remainder of the weekend at Assen following a number of incidents on the first day of running.

The elevated concrete sections of the kerbing was implemented to prevent drivers exceeding track limits and gaining an advantage. A number of drivers struck the kerbs during the morning’s private test and first practice, some of which sustained heavy front-end damage.

Assen circuit thus decided to remove the concrete kerbs and replace them with tyres from second practice.

The Hyundai i30 N TCRs of Igor Stefanovski and Loris Cencetti were among those the most affected in testing, with each suffering severe damage.

Cencetti sustained damage to the hub, suspension and driveshaft as well as broken rim. The Luxembourg driver cut the kerb at Turn 8 while following the Audi RS 3 LMS of Jean-Karl Vernay when his i30 was launched into the air.

Stefanovski also suffered the same fate, breaking his front-right damper, upright and anti-roll bar in the process.

Vernay was particularly critical of the kerbs he labelled as “dangerous”.

“I don’t know why they thought it was a good idea to put this kerb here. They are concrete and really high. They’re also pretty dangerous too,” said Vernay to TouringCarTimes.

Norwegian Stian Paulsen also spoke out about the kerbs, having missed the opening 15 minutes of second practice after changing a damper on his Cupra.

“It was much better in the second session [with the tyre stack]. I hit the sausage kerb twice in the morning test and broke the rim on the tyre and we didn’t have time to change the damper,” Paulsen said.

“I hit it again in the second session and broke the rim again, and bent the damper even more. It caused a lot of problems for everyone else because it’s so huge and dangerous.

“I was behind Loris [Cencetti] when it happened. It’s a small mistake to make but for sure it costs you a lot of money to repair it. I was so sure that if I hit it again, I would end up in Amsterdam!”