2012 season contained two big challenges for Keijo Kaasik – competing in Estonian Championship for BMW 325 Cup and competing in two VLN Championship races in Nürburgring Germany.
Estonian Championship races in 2012 season were held in four different countries. Two times the races took place in Riga. Kaunas, Hämenlinna and newly renovated Pärnu race track all held one championship event.
Starting with Estonian Championship one must say that unfortunately the season got the worst possible start in opening race in Riga. One of the competitors lost control of the car and pushed Keijo into high speed crash flipping the car upside down. So result from opening weekend was zero points and heavily damaged car. Fortunately the season continued without any big misfortunes. The next events in Kaunas and Hämenlinna already brought some points from 4-6 place finishes. Although several races contained very good lap times Keijo did not manage to put podium result together. It became clear also through the second part of the season that almost in all the racetracks there were some seconds and tenths missing from target lap times. Results were good and stable but the top of the line speed that was there last season was hard to find. Final result of the championship for Keijo was 6th with record 21 pilots collecting the points in 2012 season. Keijo summarizes the season: „It was clear that after the crash in Riga it will be extremely difficult to compete for high places in the championship. Still I would say that 3-4th place should have been reachable. During the winter we must analyze to see where the seconds and tenths where hidden. But all and all – it was a challenging season with tough competition and interesting races. Knowing what we gone through this season I must be satisfied with the result and keep my thought straight for 2013.“
Additional big challenges for Keijo Kaasik in 2012 were the VLN series races in Nürburgring Nordschleife. VLN Championship is a long distance race series that features 4-6 hour races and 2-4 pilots per one car/team. All races are held in long Nürburgring race course with one lap being approximately 25 km. Keijo Kaasik, Peep Pihotalo, Erki Koldits and Roul Liidemann where the men who formed the Estonian team. This team also made a bit of history in Estonian autosport history as these men where the first ones to tackle the famous circuit in such events. Keijo summarized the two races: „Starts in VLN race series where an extremely interesting challenge for us and also kind of starting point for „university of racing“ that Nürburgring Nordschleife is considered to be. I’m 100% sure that if you can drive quickly here then you can do it anywhere in the world. Our main target was to get the experience, to learn the track and to finish both races. Unfortunately we did not succeed the first time in July, but we did in August. And the result was also quite good for a team with our Nürburgring experience. In wider perspective we have taken the challenge of VLN races in order to qualify for legendary Nürburgring 24 race. We need minimum 3 finished VLN races to enter keeping in mind that we definitely need a lot more testing kilometers to be ready for 24 hour race. 24 hour race is extremely challenging so we need to be prepared physically, mentally and have more laps around the track. But we are definitely ready to take the challenge in the future!“ |