03/09/30 STCC Grande Finale
The STCC "Grande Finale" was held last weekend (27th to 28th of Sept) at Mantorp Park
150 km south of Stockholm. The target for Nicklas Karlsson and his team Euroracing this weekend was to fight for the podium. It also started very good on Saturday with Nicklas first or second in the free practice. The weather was cold, 8 to 10 deg C, quite changeable, with as well rain as sun, making it difficult to read the track. Just before the first qualification it started to rain heavily and Nicklas could show the performance of the Alfa 156 GTA S2000 also in this weather, again being the fastest on the track. But just before the end of the sesion it dried up suprisingly fast and slicks had to used to set the best laptimes. Unfortunately Nicklas got only one free lap on slicks and a small misstake made him miss the Super Pole. Sunday morning the sun made the start of the day comfortable and again Nicklas showed the potential of
himself and the Alfa being quickest in the morning warm up. In the 1st race Nicklas he had to start as 12th on the grid but after a very good and consistent drive Nicklas reached the 5th
place only 1 second from the podium. In the 2nd race Nicklas started as 4th on the grid
making a perfect start and he was already in second place after the first corner only having Rickard Goransson in BMW, who started in pole, in front of him when entering the long
straight. Nicklas was able to pass Goransson on the straight without any problem and could
then drive the 25 laps without any threats securing the victory in the last and most important race of the year in front of "Flash" Nilsson. The championchip leader Fredrik Ekblom finished
7th. Nicklas ended 9th in the championship with 127.