RallyX Nordic

Oskarsson Proves Age is Just a Number in Supercar Lites

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Credit: RallyX Nordic

43-year-old Mats Oskarsson was one of the front runners throughout the All-Star ‘Magic Weekend’ in the Supercar Lites series, where he went up against the majority of drivers who are all are under the age of 25.

Oskarsson again surprised onlookers after revealing in an interview that his second place finish in round two of the championship was done without a spotter.

“I’m very pleased with how the weekend went, going into it, I didn’t really have any expectations as such but I was hoping to reach the final in at least one of the rounds – and obviously, we managed to do a bit better than that…” Oskarsson said after crossing the finishing line.

The Swedish driver had great pace throughout the weekend by posting top six times in four of the seven qualifying sessions across the two events, although he missed a spot in the final on Thursday by just a second before his dramatic improvement three days later in round two.

Credit: RallyX Nordic

He continued: “It was probably the toughest field I’ve ever faced in Supercar Lites – in free practice on Saturday, there were 12 cars covered by scarcely eight tenths-of-a-second, which is incredibly tight. There were a lot of very quick young drivers in the field, but hopefully I showed that age is just a number.

“We were quick throughout, and I was a bit mad with myself on Thursday because I had more pace than Jimmie [Walfridson] in the semi-final but couldn’t quite get past him, as much as I tried. In Sunday’s semi-final, I went back-and-forth with Aneklev a few times, and I knew Jimmie had a penalty coming so I didn’t try to overtake.

Oskarsson made the final in round two after Jimmie Walfridson was deemed to have hit a tyre marker and received a time penalty that promoted him into the final after originally thinking he had again missed out on the race by just a few seconds.

After being forced to take an early joker lap in the final, he started to hunt down his rvials one-by-one as the race continued and they each took took their mandatory jokers.

He crossed the finish line in a second place and went home from Höljes sitting in fifth place overall in the championship ahead of what he hopes is a fully RallxN Nordic program in 2020.

Credit: RallyX Nordic

“I’ve shown in the past that I can be pretty fast in the wet, and I have a lot of confidence in those conditions so I felt hopeful sitting on the grid ahead of the final, but equally, I knew I was up against a lot of very strong drivers.” continued Oskarsson.

“I had three cars on my left going into Turn Two at the start, so I couldn’t take the standard lap and had to go to the joker immediately. As things transpired, that worked out perfectly. Without a spotter, I didn’t know where I was in relation to anybody else, but when [Thomas] Holmen and [Simon] Olofsson both emerged from their own jokers behind me, I began to think, ‘I might just have a chance here’.

The Supercar Lites category features identical RX2 specification cars, with the idea of providing a stepping stone into the Supercar category of rallycross.

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Covering off-road news for The Checkered Flag since 2019, with over 10 years of experience working with all sorts of publications, media & PR-related things in motorsport.
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