Freddie Slater once again showed the extent of his talent and the competitiveness of the Ricky Flynn Motorsport team in a particularly selective Winter Cup. The weather in Lonato was split between a dry start to the meeting and increasingly heavy rain late on Saturday and Sunday. Moved from February to mid-November, the 26th edition of the great Italian classic proved to be very complex to manage. This made Slater’s victory all the more valuable.
Freddie Slater started the competition with the 11th fastest time in Qualifying among the 55 entries in the OK-Junior class. The young Briton then put in some extremely strong runs in the heats, winning the last two heats to take the lead on Saturday evening. From then on, he never left the lead. He won Super Heat 1 by more than a second to consolidate his lead on a wet track. In the rain, Slater mastered his objective perfectly during the 15 laps of the Final and distanced his opponents by more than 4.5” at the finish line. What a demonstration!
Dion Gowda had a good start with 4th in Qualifying, but the problems multiplied in the heats. He still managed to qualify in 20th position for the Final and started to climb up the order on the wet track. His ascent was abruptly interrupted due to an incident when he was 16th. Salim Hanna had a series of setbacks in the heats after having set the 12th fastest time. Three retirements and a penalty prevented him from reaching the Final. Able to run in the top 10 of the heats, the Greek driver Michailidis Vasileios-Gravriil was not spared from the hazards of the race either and just missed his Final qualification.