“I proved again that, if there were fewer unlucky moments this year, I could have finished in the top five in the overall standings,” says Vladimiros Tziortzis after the seventh place he took in the last race of this season’s EuroNASCAR PRO, which took place at Circuit Zolder in Belgium.

The Cypriot driver, taking stock of this year’s season, said that he is pleased with his efforts. “I am satisfied from my side for this year. As things were going, I couldn’t do anything else” he says and adds: “I mean, when you’re with 30 other drivers and something goes wrong, you don’t know who’s going to pay for it. Unfortunately, this season in most accidents, the ball fell on me.”

Having finished the season, the Academy Motorsport/Alex Caffi Motorsports driver is looking ahead with plenty of optimism. “I feel more ready than ever for a strong 2025 racing season,” he said, adding that further details will be revealed at a press conference next month.

What happened in Belgium?

“Since Friday we had lap times that put us inside the first 5-6 drivers. On Saturday morning I entered the qualifications and the car was losing oil as a result of which I had a lot of smoke in the cockpit and I could hardly see anything,” says Tziortzis.

“There was no time to fix the problem and we decided to push with what we had. This resulted in me qualifying ninth.”

Within three minutes, oil was added to prevent engine damage and the Cypriot driver continued for three more laps, managing to hold on to ninth place despite the smoke growing thicker.

In the afternoon at the first race in Belgium, starting from ninth place, the Cypriot was hit from behind by Lucas Lasserre in the first corner, causing him to spin. Then he hit him in the front again, which twisted his steering wheel and the plastic bumper was on the tires, which ended up being destroyed by the end of the race.

Despite the misfortune, Tziortzis continued his effort to score as many points as he could, eventually finishing in 16th place.

In Sunday’s race he was placed 20th on the starting line, after damage on Saturday prevented him from setting faster laps, and the aim was simply to finish.

The second race was much better, as he finished seventh, picking up a further eight points after making 13 passes, the most of any other driver.

Gold sponsor of Tziortzis’ effort is the company HTFX, while he is supported by ALCO Filters, ENEOS Motor Oil, Psaltis Auto Parts, Televantos Used Trucks, PrivenGAS, Sana Hiltonia and Daytona Raceway.