Rast Continues to Dominate the Porsche Mobil 1 SuperCup

Manama, Sunday 14th March 2010: The 2nd race of the 1st round of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup season got underway today, following yesterday’s exciting race two where Rast sped to victory. With the track temperature reaching 48° Celsius it didn’t take long for the Porsche 911 GT3 cars to warm up for the 62.7 km race. A 25 car starting grid was headed by Rast with Tandy to his left and Bleekemolen directly behind. Rosina lined up in 4th and yesterday’s 3rd place finisher Seyffarth found himself in disappointing 6th. C. Engelhart got off to a disastrous start and pitted early on during the warm up lap, ending any chance of a decent finish. As the race kicked off Tandy of Konrad Motorsport found his car blocked on both sides by an aggressive Bleekemolen and Rosina, who eventually squeezed out the 2nd place starter on the main straight.

As the pack sped into turn one Langhorne found Breen’s rear bumper in his path and nudged the Sanitec driver out of way, leaving him to spin uncontrollably and blocking several cars in the process. Cunhill shot into the pit soon after and didn’t emerge following technical malfunctions.

With Rast, J. Bleekemolen, Rosina and Tandy leading from the front, the competitors settled in for the ten lap race. Seyffarth suffered the attentions of Maasen who rammed the Veltins MRS Racnig driver repeatedly, resulting in significant damage to the rear bumper which trailed dangerously on the track.

Siedler improved on his 5th starting position and found himself bumper to bumper with Tandy who held 3rd place. The two remained inches apart as the cars blistered through turns six, seven and eight. The pair were joined by several other competitors as the group sped down the straight following turn 22, where the drivers prepared for the high speed turn one.

Lukas, loosing control of his car momentarily, collided with 19th place Al Gosaibi on lap four causing the driver to spin violently and ended up facing the wrong direction in a perfect position to watch the rest of the championship speed by, leaving him in the dust.

A fustrated Huisman found himself boxed in on turn 21 with a damaged Sayffarth in-front and Halliday fast approaching from the rear. Maassen, sensing an opportunity, took the inner corner and slipped in behind Sayffarth. As the competitors blistered down the track on the straight of lap five, Bridgman managed to squeeze in between Huisman’s car and the barrier in a risky maneuver to claim 9th. Further back Massen edged Seyforth out for 11th.

Seyffarth continued to be the target of unwanted attention as Al Khalifa bumped the already damaged rear bumper on turn three, causing even more debris to dislocate itself from Seyffarth’s car. This put an abrupt end to Seffarth’s attempts to pass Huisman on the inner corner as he quickly pulled his car away from the run off area to avoid further damage.

A reckless Al Khalifa sped down the main straight at the beginning of lap six and entered turn one at an uncontrollable velocity which resulted in the driver careering off track and into the gravel. Luckily no other cars were close and the Lechner Racing driver managed to loop back and rejoin the race, albeit a few positions behind.

Huisman took a page out of Bridgman’s book and sped past Seyffarth by squeezing in-between his competitor and the pit wall for 11th on the main straight, leaving a frustrated Seyffarth in 12th.

As the final lap approached an aggressive Maasen continually scraped S. Bleekemolen’s bumper as he determinedly tried to find a way into 9th. He eventually managed to speed pack on turn 8. Meanwhile Huisman led the middle of the pack with Seyffarth not far behind still trailing his now useless bumper. Al Khalifa followed in 13th.

Rast crossed the finished line in 1st yet again in a time of 15:51.077, with J. Bleekemolen improving on yesterday’s position to finish in 2nd and Tandy settling for 3rd in 25:55.571.