Pau, Sprint: Third win of the season for Payne and Päivärinta, ahead of Christie in second place

The forecast heatwave has swept across half of Europe this weekend and has also engulfed south-western France. This has also had an impact on the Sidecar World Championship races. The sprint race, originally scheduled to run over 16 laps on the Circuit Européen Pau Arnos – which is just 3.030 kilometres long – was shortened to twelve laps due to the extreme conditions.

In qualifying, Harry Payne and Kevin Rousseau (Steinhausen Racing) secured pole position with a narrow lead of 0.097 seconds over Pekka Päivärinta and Adam Christie. Third on the grid were the reigning champions Sam and Tom Christie (CES Performance), ahead of Markus Schlosser and Lucas Krieg (Gustoil Sidecar Racing), who had edged out Todd Ellis and Emmanuelle Clément by 26 thousandths of a second to take fifth place.

Following the close qualifying session, a fierce battle between Payne and Päivärinta was expected, but after just the opening lap, the Briton had already pulled away by over half a second from his closest rival, who had the Christie brothers in his wake. Ellis had moved into fourth place ahead of Paul Leglise and Marjorie Cescutti (521 Competition) and Bennie Streuer and Manon Vissenberg.

Schlosser and Tim Reeves/Melanie Farnier (Carl Cox Motorsport) ‘squandered’ their chances of a better finish as early as the first lap. The Swiss driver dropped back to eleventh position, whilst the Briton even crossed the start-finish line in thirteenth place. Although they managed to climb a few places during the race, the former world champions cannot be satisfied with eighth (Reeves) and ninth (Schlosser) places respectively.

At the front, Payne/Rousseau were slowly but surely pulling away from Päivärinta/Christie. At the halfway stage, the British-French pair were already more than a second ahead. On the seventh lap, they also managed to break the lap record of 1:20.105 minutes, which had been held since 2016 (!) by Sébastien Delannoy, who had Rousseau as his co-driver at the time. This effectively decided the outcome of the battle for victory.

Behind Payne and Päivärinta, Christie crossed the finish line in third place ahead of Ellis and Leglise, who held off Streuer’s attacks. Manuel Moreau and Alice Roba (KM Side) achieved their best result of the season with seventh place. Corey and Danyon Turner, who had been in seventh place for much of the race, took the chequered flag in tenth place, ahead of Markus Venus/Thomas Hofer (ITW Racing) and Wiggert Kranenburg/Loris Charteau (Team Flying Dutchmen).

Results, Sidecar World Championship, Pau Arnos, Sprint Race