TT World Assen

With thousands of orange Rizla caps the audience waved to the race stars during the anniversary edition of the Rizla Racing Day on Sunday 9 August at the TT Circuit Assen. There was a massive turnout for the tenth edition of the largest combined motor and karting race event of the Netherlands. As much as 57,000 visitors came to Assen to experience the great race show. They enjoyed it to the full. Especially the demo of the RIZLA Suzuki MotoGP Team, with Loris Capirossi and Chris Vermeulen and also the fast lap driven by Jeroen Bleekemolen with the A1GP racing car were enormous crowd-pullers.

Jeroen Bleekemolen posted the fastest time ever in a demo with a A1GP racing car on the TT Circuit. Sunday afternoon he drove a lap in the new Ferrari with a time of 1,30,214; two tenth faster than two years ago when Bleekemolen drove 1,30,486.

Motor fans took this opportunity to collect autographs from the GP racing drivers Loris Capirossi and Chris Vermeulen and the motorcyclists who were all wearing Rizla-blue worked overtime. The laps driven by the couple on their GP motorcycles were received with loud applause.
In the actual rallies firm battles were fought out. The team of Van Amersfoort Racing was enormously successful in the ATS Formel 3 Cup because both races of these fast fomula cars were won by the Van Amersfoort driver Laurens Vanthoor from Belgium. During the first of the two rallies, there was even a double success for Van Amersfoort when Stef Dusseldorp claimed second position.

The NEC Formula Renault 2.0 became an easy prey for Antonio Felix da Costa from Portugal who won both rallies convincingly.
Door-to-door, bumper-to-bumper the BRL V6 and BRL Light sport cars rushed over the track. Both Saturday’s and Sunday’s race gave a great deal of pleasure for tens of thousands of enthusiastic race fans on the stands. Even though the races were not entirely by the rules and maybe just because of that, both races were a wonderful sight. The rally on Saturday was a prey for Donald Molenaar. On Sunday however Molenaar had to put up with Van Es in front him.
In the first rally of the Dutch Supercar Challenge Martin Short defeated Cor Euser and in the second race the Danny Werkman and Nicky Pastorelli duo finished the rally winning.
The high-speed karts which were already active from the beginning of the Rizla Racing Day, drove two races. The competition on Saturday was convincingly won by Gavin Bennet and on Sunday the Frenchman Damden Payard took the credits.

Tens of thousands of people enjoyed the dual between Roy ten Napel and Ronald ter Braake in the motorclass Dutch Supersport on Sunday. The beautiful duals fought by the two, were fascinating during the whole race. It was Roy ten Napel who, with hardly a tenth of a second, took the gain before Ter Braake would.
At the Dutch Superbike Martin Bauer could not be beaten. The German won the first part of the race and also the second heat. The competition was divided into two parts because the Italian Dario Guiseppetti suffered a fall, which turned out well though.

Youthful zest could be seen in the demo race of Honda NSF 100 Championship in which young talented race-drivers competed with each other.
In the beautiful programme during the break with the Rizla MotoGP Team there was a moment of appreciation for organizer Lee van Dam of LDP International who organized the Rizla Racing Day for the tenth time. He received a roar of applause from the audience. This by way of thanks to the ten incredible Rizla Racing Days held on the TT Circuit of Assen.