Motorsport: Dinkel twins continue winning streak

Patrik and Marcel Dinkel continue to surf the wave of success. After their victory at the Untergröningen Rally Sprint, the Mitsubishi duo repeated their last year's success at the 16th ADAC Main-Kinzig Rally with start and finish in Wächtersbach in front of a record-breaking field.

Patrik and Marcel Dinkel in the Brose Mitsubishi Evo 9 RS opened the event with the first fastest time - here, a series of minor slips caused a lot of action - Dinkel also touched a straw roller at the tight hairpin in the starting area. Rudolf Reindl / Michael Ehrle set the fastest time on the 7.32 kilometer sprint stage. With the fastest time in special stage 3, which slightly favoured the all-wheel-drive vehicles with a gravel content of about 25 per cent, the Dinkel twins led by 4.5 seconds over their strongest opponents at the half-time break.

"In the second round Reindl and Ehrle will keep up the pressure - so we only have the escape to the front", Patrik and Marcel summed up the situation at half-time. They were right with this assessment - while Reindl/Ehrle briefly reduced the gap with a close best time in special stage 4, the Dinkels extended their lead to 8.5 seconds in the final stages. "We are overjoyed that we were able to repeat our victory from last year. As expected, the competition was very strong, but we drove at the limit right from the start and didn't make any driving mistakes."

On August 19 and 20, the ADAC Saarland-Pfalz Rally with start and finish in St. Wendel is scheduled as the penultimate round of the German Rally Championship. Here, Patrik Dinkel will start with Alexander Benning, who will act as co-driver for the two remaining DRM events.