Photo: TCR South America

Rosso dominates at El Pinar to close in on Pezzini

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Juan Ángel Rosso dominated from pole position in the opening TCR South America race at El Pinar in Uruguay.

Although the Argentinian lost the lead on the opening lap, as a rocket start from fifth on the grid sent Enrique Maglione into second place in just a handful of metres and then past Rosso through the fast Veloz right-hander that opens the lap as he swept to his inside.

First place was regained at the first braking zone as Maglione carried too much speed through the direction change of the second corner and started sliding, doing same at the next corner too.

Pedro Aizza came from row three of the grid too to jump to third, and pressured Maglione as Rosso set about pulling away and taking his third consecutive win.

There was a growing gap too between Aizza and the multi-car battle for fourth, and it looked like the podium order had been set. Halfway through the race Aizza started to slow down though, losing two places in one lap and then plummeting down the order with a car issue.

Juan Manuel Casella initially ran in fourth ahead of Franco Farina, but they were destined not to remain there for long as charging up from the back of the grid was the Lynk & Co 03-driving pair José Manuel Sapag and Fabricio Pezzini.

In two laps Pezzini went from 14th to eighth, while Sapag rose from 13th to 10th, and Pezzini passed the squabbling Raphael Reis and Franco Farina on lap five of 21. Their battle continued into the next lap however, and Sapag passed both.

He closed in on the pair ahead, and on lap 10 Casella got passed by Reis and Sapag. He was quickly dropped by them, and they moved past the soon-to-be ailing Aizza two laps later. That moment gave Reis some breathing room ahead of Sapag, and he wasn’t able to get back onto his tail until far later in the race as Reis had closed in on Maglione and was losing time behind him.

On lap 19 Sapag demoted Reis to fourth with a pass under braking, which then gave Maglione the opportunity to get clear and secure second place.

Points leader Pezzini spent a long time bottled up behind Casella but still managed to rise up to fifth place, and Laceu Feldmann cleared Casella for sixth with a penultimate lap pass.

The second race takes place at 11:40 local time (16:40 CEST).