With the summer finally over here in America, Nitro Rallycross is falling into its next leg of the championship as the series heads to ERX Motor Park for round three of the championship.
RX Cartel remains the team to beat coming off of two round wins, each coming from their two drivers Andreas Bakkerud and Robin Larsson. Both Bakkerud and Larsson competed here last year giving so it should make for a comfortable event for them. The two have had some friendly battles and a good rivalry going into this round and being a track they’ve both run at, expect it to be more of the same. Larsson leads the championship with 58 points while Bakkerud follows closely behind at 48.
Vermont Sportscar hasn’t had the best start to the season after Travis Pastrana and Connor Martell both suffered from penalties or track moves that didn’t prove successful. Now back on American soil, the native duo seeks to start to get back to a standard form this weekend at ERX. Pastrana raced here last year and pulled out his first podium finishing second on the weekend behind then-teammate Scott Speed. Martell will get his first taste of ERX this weekend as he tackles it in the FC1-X. Pastrana and Martell are sitting seventh and ninth respectively.
After a few fill-ins, Kevin Eriksson finally makes his return to NRX after breaking his foot in the preseason. Filling in for him, and garnering a decent amount of points in the process, was Finnish and World Rallycross driver Niclas Gronholm. Now that Kevin has returned he and his brother, Oliver Eriksson aim to take the fight to their competition. Last time out in ERX the Eriksson’s both suffered from damage ending their racing in last chance qualifiers and the early laps of the final.
Rounding out the field is XITE Energy Racing as Jensen Button makes his first appearance this season and Oli Bennet returns to take revenge on ERX. Button stands to make a mighty large impression as this is his first weekend ever competing in rallycross. The Former F1 Driver’s World Champion made the commitment to the North American rounds of Nitro Rallycross so he will be available for parts of this second season. Bennet ran the MINI his last time competing at the venue and suffered to many mechanical errors to make an impact. Third entry Kris Meeke should make his return later in the season but his strong season start boasted good news for XITE. While Button has no points due to this being his first appearance, Meeke places eight with 29 points and Bennet sits in tenth with 18 points.
This weekend is also set to have the traditional sub class, NRX NEXT and the supporting class of Side by Sides (SxS). The NEXT class features all previous entries, excluding a missing Martin Enlund. SxS class sees the return of Brian Deegan as he is joined by newcomers like Leticia Bufoni and Ben Maier.