One month after Jesolo, the ROK Cup Italy is back on track for the fifth round of the season, on the occasion of the "night event" in Lonato del Garda. In total, 262 drivers livened up the races of the seven categories running at South Garda Karting. Kralev Leo (Mini ROK U10), Verde Marco (Mini ROK), Melis Matteo (Junior ROK), Gaglianò Giuseppe (Senior ROK), Sorbello Andrea (Expert ROK), Ferrari Riccardo (Super ROK) and Pasiewicz Karol (Shifter ROK).

Mini ROK U10

The category of the youngest drivers, the Mini ROK U10, offers two spectacular races on Saturday.

The challenge is already fired in the qualifyings, featured by 25 drivers in less than nine tenths of a second. Giovanni Ventorino, with a time of 55.052 seconds, takes the pole position and beats Josh Bergman, second classified, by only 0.010 seconds. Phawin Warakitsupachok finishes in third place, +0.017 seconds from the top, while Wynn Godschalk and Natan Lukas record the same chrono time and are fourth and fifth respectively. Elias Boullier is sixth, Ghazi Almekdad is seventh, Filip Stec is eighth, Farel Beretta Dugat is ninth and Radek Czernicki is tenth. The ranking continues with Leo Kralev, Leon Giudicelli, Syabil Umar Basalamah, Edoardo Traina, Amine Pantoli, Antonio Martin, Iker Castro, Nico Fardin, Anna Makolm, Nicolaj Pietras, Matteo Meni, Sebastiano Leone Cecchin, Samuel Dal Pozzo, Luka Macura, Gabriel Mara Varon, John Farfus and Giorgio Sapignoli.

In Race 1, Ventorino jumps well from the pole position, unlike Bergman who goes back to fourth place, behind Warakitsupachok and Natan. The American driver, however, does not give up: during the second lap he regains the second position and, in the next one, overtakes Ventorino, taking the lead. The Italian driver, however, remains glued to his rival throughout the race, until, in the last lap, he joins him and take the first place. Bergman reacts but this allowing Warakitsupachok to move up to second place. Bergman crosses the finish line first, but receives a penalty of 5 seconds in the post-race for an overtaking under the yellow flag. The victory then goes to Warakitsupachok, followed by Ventorino, second, and Stec, third after a recovery of eighth positions on the grid. Bergman finishes in fourth position. Lukas retires.

In Race 2, Boullier makes the most of his pole position – obtained thanks to the reversal of the top eight finishers in Race 1 – and leads the group during the early stages of the race. Bergman climbs up to second place after a few corners, while Ventorino is forced to retire due to an accident. On the second lap, Bergman tries to take the lead, but the move drops him to fourth place, passed by Sapignoli and Warakitsupachok. And it is the Thai driver who, taking advantage of the moment, even manages to take the lead of the race. Returning second, Bergman starts a long and intense duel with Warakitsupachok, until he overtakes him on the penultimate lap; the American thus wins ahead of his Tyrolean rival and Natan Lukas, author of a comeback of 21 positions to third place. Boullier finishes fourth.

Mini ROK

An exceptional number of 43 drivers take part in the fifth round of the championship in the Mini ROK category.

Dominic Wojcik wins the qualifyings. The Polish driver is the fastest in Group 1 with a chrono time of 54.449 seconds, thanks to which he takes the pole position. Chasers are the Italian drivers Niccolò Perico, first in group 2 with 54.548 seconds and second placed, Alessandro Nanni, third, and Luigi D'Ascoli, fourth. Aleksander Pelikanski finishes fifth, ahead of Giuseppe Noviello, sixth, Daniel Hakkinen, seventh, and Marco Verde, eighth. Patrick Bissa and Jan Gardzielik complete the top-10, ninth and tenth respectively. The chrono practices also see on track Romain Lopez, Ayrton Jon Tonna, Lucas Doillon, Lorenzo Zucchetto, Paul Plattner-Geramb, Laurent Shahinaj, Johannes Buchhammer, Nicholas Lorusso, Thomas Ometto, Mattia Pellin, Dilan Roman Fricker, Massimo Lorusso, Dawid Tyndel, Tommaso Pomoni, Andrea Buffo, Dimitar Lazarov, Andrea Screpis, Awa Jean Lawrence, Gonzalez Perez Alonso Andre, Lena Szyfter, Nicolò Poli, Camilla Amarotti,  Sebastian Schirripa, Giulio Manzoni, Aleksander Czub, Axel Gore, Alex Dal Maso, Filip Babiarz, Nicholas Bertolani, Louis Pachleitner, Jonas Habesohn, Nathan Lotrionte and Nicolas Yerly.

In the qualifying heats, D'Ascoli makes the difference: with two victories in two heats, the Italian driver takes the lead in the intermediate standings and secures the pole position for the final. Perico collects a victory and a second place, results that allow him to keep the second place. Bissa gains six positions and is third, while Wojcik goes back to fourth place. Verde, fifth, precedes Doillon and Plattner-Geramb, both entering the top-10. Gardzielik, Noviello and Hakkinen complete the top ten. Two retirements affect the path of Pelikanski and Nanni who are respectively 22nd and 24th.

The final, unlike the heats, is held on a completely wet track. At the start, D'Ascoli makes no mistakes and remains in the lead, with Perico momentarily giving up his second position only in the first corners. And it is Perico who soon becomes the main protagonist of the race: on the third lap he takes the lead and begins to gain a considerable advantage over D'Ascoli. At the end of the time, Perico passes alone under the checkered flag, while D'Ascoli conquers the place of honor. Noviello wins the duel against Gardzielik and gets the lowest step of the podium. Fifth is Verde, sixth is Lawrence and seventh is Bissa.

Junior ROK

Also in the Junior ROK there are great numbers, with 57 drivers ready to fight for the victory of this night round.

The pole position in the qualifyings is run on the edge of thousandths of a second. Blazej Kostrzewa, with a time of 49.148 seconds in group 2, narrowly beats Xie Huifei, the fastest in group 1 in 49.151 seconds. Leonardo Lanza finishes third, ahead of Matteo Melis, fourth and championship leader on the eve of the weekend, Tomasz Cichoracki, fifth, and Michal Zajac, sixth. Faidon Papafilippou is seventh, Borys Blaszcyzk is eighth, Ilias Mitaki is ninth, and Odin Flora is tenth. The ranking continues with Samuel Del Gaudi, Sebastian Riedel, Alan Jakobiak, Stefano Zamponi, Adrian Potepa, Sofia Povazhnaia, Milosz Smuk, Victoria Farfus, Mateusz Wal, Iven Ammann, Ethan Tyers, Alexander Volkmer, Matteo Peruccio, Leonardo De Grandi, Julia Angelard, Matteo Infantino, Mariachiara Nardelli, Francesca Pietrini, Enzo Stambaugh, Selina Baum, Francesco Iannuzzo, Quinn Tyers, Nikola Nikolic, Stanislaw Grabowski, Aleksander Mrozik,  Vasco De Vito, Mikolaj Gawlikowski, Lena Pichler, Natan Rybczynski, Fernando Eleaza Visuet Cruz, Enrico Pietro Villa, Kacper Kluk, Zachary Ibbotson, Michal Czyzewicz, Adriyan Anachkov, Maxim Becker, Andrea Proverbio, Bruno Bisceglia, Carlo Pongratz, Pietro Chesini, Jessica Calleja, Seán Beck Davies, Oguz Marangoz, Ismet Yilmaz, Sebastiano Cecchini, Giada Vanigioli and Advan Auriel Warren.

The qualifying heats see Melis and Cichoracki get the same results (two victories and a third place), but it is the Italian driver who wins the first position in the intermediate ranking, relegating the Polish driver to the second. Kostrzewa wins the first heat but then finishes twice in second place: for this reason, he slips to third place. Papafilippou climbs to fourth place, while Potepa, Jakobiak and Peruccio rise considerably in the rankings, accessing the top-10. Mitaki and Flora are eighth and ninth, ahead of Lanza, who slips to tenth. Huifei, on the other hand, relegates to 15th place.

Despite the rain, Melis performs an excellent start in the final and immediately tries to stretch on the first group of chasers, made up of Kostrzewa, Potepa and Peruccio. On the other hand, Cichoracki does not have a brilliant start and finds himself fifth after a few corners. With the road clear ahead of him, Melis records a series of fast laps that allow him to constantly increase his advantage over Kostrzewa, while Cichoracki manages to get behind Peruccio and Potepa. Without someone able to prevent him, Melis secures his fourth consecutive victory in the championship. Kostrzewa, on the other hand, contains Cichoracki and hits the place of honor. Potepa and Peruccio finish fourth and fifth respectively.

Senior ROK

The Senior ROK is no less than the other categories and takes to the track with as many as 51 drivers.

Top-driver in the standings at the end of the qualifyings is Riccardo Salemi, author of the best time of 47.992 seconds in group 1. Giuseppe Gaglianò imposes himself in group 2 with 48.072 and conquers the second place. Alberto Bernardi takes the third position, followed by Michael Rosina, fourth, Colin Wazny, fifth, and Davide Lombardo, sixth. Anh Tu Ranghetti places seventh and precedes Samuel Di Filippo, eighth, Samuele Rizza, ninth, and Mattia d'Erme, tenth. Iwo Beszterda, Mattia Jentile, Emilio Tedesco, Alexandre Lopez, Riccardo Chiodo, Andrea Giudice, Mikolaj Kania, Andrea Barbieri, Giovanni Polato, Vaclav Prochazka, Christian Romeo, Leonardo Monzani, Oskar Hildebranski, Marlon Di Salvo, Luca Perelli, Paolo Dung Pastori, Jan Turk Blazic, Simone Taccola, Emilio Ortolani, Christos Chatzis, Franciszek Lassota, Marek Lipkowski, Piotr Orzechowski, Arthur Niculiu, Nik Ščulac, Nassim Bouarfa, Tomas Kuzela, Antoni Makuch, Alessandro Giarratano, Franciszek Czapla, Lukáš Lehnert, Alessandro Merigo, Ludovica Miceli, Lukasz Jezierski, Nicole Ameglio, Kyle Ducoli, Marcin Dokucki, Ewa Banach, Jakub Kazana, James Albert George Batubara and Cristiano Gautier also attend the chrono practices.

With a second place in the first heat and a victory in the second (on a wet track), Rosina jumps to the top of the intermediate standings and takes the pole position in view of the final. Mattia Jentile also performs an excellent race, author of a victory and a fourth place, in second position. Gaglianò secures the third place, followed by Beszterda, who climbs to fourth, and Salemi, on the contrary, who drops to fifth place. Wazny is sixth, while Lopez and Barbieri manage to get into the top-10, seventh and eighth respectively. Ninth position for Ranghetti, tenth for Prochazka, eleventh for Lombardo. Thanks to a stop in the first heat, Bernardi go down to 25th place, one position ahead of his compatriot Di Filippo, 26th.

In the final, Rosina does not take advantage of the pole position and immediately falls back to the rear. Taking the lead is Gaglianò, who jumps from the second row, chased by his teammate Salemi who is followed in order by Lopez, Wazny, Barbieri and Jentile. The completely wet track becomes tough for the most of drivers, except for Gaglianò who firmly maintains the lead. Behind him, Salemi gives up his second position to Lopez and is also overtaken by Wazny: the two are the only ones able to keep up with the Italian leader of the race. At the end of the time plus one lap, Gaglianò can celebrate the victory at the finishing line, ahead of Wazny, second, and Lopez, third. Barbieri and Prochazka arrive in the wake of the Polish and the French drivers, finishing fourth and fifth respectively. Lombardo and Salemi are sixth and seventh, ahead of Giudice, eighth. Rosina stops.

Expert ROK

The “senators” of the Expert ROK category cannot miss the start of the night race in Lonato del Garda.

Filippo Repetto puts everyone in line in qualifying: the Italian, with a time of 48.872 seconds, conquers the pole position, slightly beating his compatriots Claudio Pagliarani and Paolo Baselli, respectively second and third. Michele Zampieri follows in fourth position, with Alessandro Viganò, fifth, and Jorge Rodolfo Matos Bedoya, sixth. Fourth row for Andrea Sorbello and Riccardo Pini, while the fifth one sees Daniel Zajac and Adrian Marcinkiewicz. Outside the top-10 we find Tino Donadei, Gianfranco Spallarossa, Marco Nannavecchia, Luca Molinari, Gianluca Todeschini, Gianluca Rubiolini, Marzio Cavini, Eitam Turchin, Marco Pometti, Luca Davì, Marco Beretta, Marcin Wnuk, Claudio Tiberio and Ivo Cicognini.

In Race 1, Pagliarani performs a good start ahead of Repetto and goes to the lead at the first corner; for this reason, the race direction immediately assigns a three-second penalty to the reigning champion of the ROK Cup Winter Trophy. At the end of the lap, Repetto also suffers the attack of Zampieri and loses several positions in the standings. Despite the penalty, Pagliarani begins to record a series of fast laps and extends his lead over the group of pursuers, led first by Zampieri and, starting from the sixth lap, by Viganò. At the end of the 16 scheduled laps, Pagliarani is first under the checkered flag and secures the victory, with Viganò second classified with a gap of 1.244 seconds. Repetto succeeds to gain the lowest step of the podium, ahead of Baselli, Matos, Zampieri and Pini.

Race 2 begins with the duel between Zajac and Viganò, but soon the two have to give way to a wild Pagliarani, very fast even on the wet asphalt. Behind the top three drivers, Beretta and Sorbello stand out by climbing to fourth and fifth position, respectively. Less than five minutes from the end, the twist arrives: Viganò ends up in a spin and is forced to retire. The race ends with the second victory of the weekend by Pagliarani, with Zajac in the second place of honor and Sorbello on the lowest step of the podium. Beretta, Matos Bedoya, Spallarossa, Wnuk and Molinari complete the top eight rankings.

Super ROK

The Super ROK, the most performing single-speed category of the ROK Cup Italy, collects a total of 40 drivers to Lonato del Garda.

Qarrar Firhand is very fast in the qualifyings, thanks to a time of 47.412 seconds, thus securing the pole position, beating the competition of both Bartosz Grzywacz, first in group 2 with 47.612 seconds and second classified, and Zach Taylor, third in the combined standings. Mattia D'Abramo begins the night event in fourth place in the chrono practice, ahead of Nicolas Marchesi, fifth, Emmanouil Lioudakis, sixth, Matteo Berruti, seventh, and Alex Laghezza, eighth. Alex Desario and Matteo Favero are ninth and tenth, respectively. Running on track we also see Daniele Galbiati, Gaia Cardinali, Alessandro Cocozza, Giulio Mazzolini, Riccardo Ferrari, Alessandro Arrey Bernardini, Nicholas Giuseppe Reino, Nicola Marini, Edoardo Prioglio, Riccardo Cocozza, Rafael Kamal, Alessandro Zini, Vittorio Maria Russo, Pietro Camerlengo, Guido Bidoli, Pietro Mondin, Elliot Shaw, Andrea Marsella, Simone Donchi, Scott Reilly, Matteo Lazzarotto, Manuel Gritti, Matilde Seregni, Samuele Sottile, Emanuele Kamata,  Andrea Saporiti, Giuseppe Palladino, Theodoros Salavanitis, Mattia Cocch and Gabriele Cucinotta.

Firhand and Grzywacz exchange their positions at the end of the qualifying heats. The Polish driver scores two victories and secures his first place, while the Indonesian obtains a success and a second position that take him to second place. Marchesi and Taylor follow. respectively in third and fourth place, with D'Abramo fifth. Cardinali and Russo, thanks to two important comebacks, are sixth and seventh, respectively. Behind Laghezza, eighth, there is space for Bidoli, also coming from the low-ranking positions. Ferrari completes the top-10.

Despite the rain, the final lights up immediately at the start. Grzywacz, jumped from the pole position, maintains the lead, but is immediately attacked by Marchesi and Firhand. After just one lap, Marchesi takes the lead, but Grzywacz reacts by immediately trying to counter-overtake. The maneuver, however, favors Firhand, who takes advantage of the tussle for the leading place. In this bagarre, D'Abramo – in fourth position – comes into collision with Marchesi: both end up in a spin. In the following meters, Grzywacz is running again ahead of Firhand, but the Indonesian driver responds promptly and regains the leadership, forcing Grzywacz to give up two positions that go to the advantage of Russo and Laghezza. Firhand arrives first at the finish line, but due to the previous collision with Grzywacz he is penalized by three seconds. The victory, therefore, goes into the hands of Laghezza, ahead of Russo and Firhand. Grzywacz, on the other hand, ranks fourth.

Shifter ROK

Two heated and exciting races feature the Shifter ROK weekend.

The championship’s leader, Karol Pasiewicz performs a great start with the pole position in the qualifyings. The Polish driver, with a time of 46.991 seconds, precedes Marco Acquarella, second, by 0.074 seconds. Marco Chiarello gets the third position, behind Andrea Zemin, fourth, Leonardo Principalli, fifth, and Gabriele Bensi, sixth. Seventh place for Brando Pozzi, eighth for Luca Bettoni, ninth for Davide Cordera and tenth for Kevin Cancelli. Followed by Roberto Manduchi, Paolo Fracasso, Ronny Tabakovic, Manuel Daziano, Nikolaos Fragkakis, Tymoteusz Ksiadz, Riccardo Franciosi, Davide Cominazzini and Mateo Moni.

In Race 1, Pasiewicz makes no mistakes when the lights go out and keeps the first position in the very early stages of the race, while Acquarella lets Chiarello pass and, at the end of the lap, also Zemin. Principalli, on the other hand, moves slowly from the fifth starting box and, shortly after, retires. Pasiewicz immediately imposes his own pace on the race, unsustainable for the pair formed by Chiarello and Zemin. The final chequered flag seals Pasiewicz's success ahead of the two Italian drivers, who finish second and third respectively. Thanks to a comeback of seven positions, Manduchi takes the fourth place, but in the post-race checks, he is underweight and is relegated to the bottom of the standings. Bensi inherits the fourth position, ahead of Cancelli and Acquarella. Pozzi, also underweight, ranks last.

In Race 2, Fracasso wastes the start from the pole position (thanks to the reversal of the first eight of Race 1), immediately going to the rear. On the contrary, Pasiewicz burns everyone at the start and immediately jumps into the lead. Behind the Polish driver are Cancelli, Cominazzini, Cordera and Chiarello. With Pasiewicz immediately on the run, the focus is on the fight for second place, which sees Cominazzini leave the scene after a few laps. Entering the battle is Pozzi who, on the other hand, starting from the back, becomes the protagonist of the race: in a few laps, in fact, he climbs to second place, but in the last laps he has to defend himself from Ksiadz. Pasiewicz crosses first and alone the chequered flag, while Ksiadz, second, is disqualified for a technical irregularity. Pozzi therefore, inherits the place of honor, preceding Chiarello on the podium. Daziano recovers 13 positions and is fourth.