Anton Marklund lacked the ultimate pace needed as he failed to make the final on day two of the World RX of Latvia.
The GCK Bilstein driver had consistent results all day but even in clean air, the Renault Megane was clearly someway behind the Volkswagen, Audi, Hyundai and Peugeot‘s pace in Riga.
Having had technical issues on Saturday, the team worked hard to resolve the problems as Marklund made the semi-final on Sunday.
An early joker lap was the right strategy call from GCK Bilstein since Marklund started on the back row but it was not enough even with Andreas Bakkerud‘s big crash after contact with Timo Scheider.
Marklund said: “We’ve been working very hard on the car this weekend and everyone on the team had to absolutely put their everything in to try and mitigate some of the niggles that already reared their heads yesterday. We started to pick up some pace in the end but it wasn’t quite strong enough.
“The semi-final had us finish in 4th due to Scheider’s disqualification, however, as a result of the race having been red-flagged, the previous lap’s standings stood and Andreas would’ve got the grid spot and of course was unable to so Kevin Hansen took the spot in the final ahead of me.
“A close call to the final but it wasn’t to be today and the priority is that Andreas is ok.”
Marklund and GCK Bilstein will be hoping they will be back on the pace of the front runners at the next rounds at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya in October.
