At the Misano World Circuit, great battles continued in race 2 of the first round of the Porsche Carrera Cup Italia, won by Keagan Masters who, with the 911 GT3 Cup of Team Q8 Hi Perform, signed his first victory of the season and took revenge on poleman Ten Voorde, winner last night in race 1 and second today after a complicated first lap in which he took the lead but then made a small mistake by going wide at the exit of the Variante del Parco.
In fact, at that moment Masters managed to overtake the reigning champion, who shortly afterwards was also attacked by Simone Iaquinta. The two came into contact and, having ended up spinning, the Calabrian driver of Prima Ghinzani had to return to the pits, suffering his second damaged arm in two races.
With one of the most anticipated protagonists out of the game, the fight between Masters and Ten Voorde resumed after a safety car period (used after the second lap due to a carambola between Steven Giacon, Horia-Traian Chirigut and Max Montagnese at the back, with these two last unlucky protagonists who remained stationary on the track), while Lirim Zendeli immediately took third place, improving compared to race 1.
At the restart on lap 5 Masters maintained the lead and showed a better race pace than Ten Voorde, so much so that the South African managed to accumulate a good advantage and set 4 faster laps almost in a row, the last one on lap 10 in 1’36″242 it earned the South African the additional point which allows him to move even closer to the Dutchman in the general classification.
With today’s second place, the Fulgenzi Racing rider reaches 50 points, with his rival from Q8 Hi Perform just 4 points behind. Returning to race 2, behind them Zendeli kept an ideal pace to maintain the third place achieved on the first lap until the finish line: for the new German entry of the Ombra team the first podium of the career between the 911 GT3 Cup and in GT after the excellent past in single-seaters.
Zendeli also won the award for best Rookie of race 2, even if Francesco Braschi remains at the top in the new ranking. After the podium obtained in race 1, once again today the 19-year-old standard bearer of Dinamic Motorsport showed competitiveness and also cold blood in overtaking Alberto Cerqui around halfway through the race to gain a precious fourth position, defended without problems until the finish.
Cerqui, however, was subsequently also attacked by DIego Bertonelli and Gianmarco Quaresmini. The Tuscan from TDE, in the opinion of the race direction, however exaggerated in overtaking his BeDriver rival and was penalized 5 seconds for the contact. All to the advantage of Quaresmini, who shortly after overtook Cerqui in a nice duel up to the Carro, earning his first top-5 of the season on his return with Tsunami RT.
With Bertonelli penalized, Cerqui therefore maintained at least sixth position (as in race 1), preceding Aldo Festante (seventh with Dinamic Motorsport), an increasingly convincing Janne Stiak, the very young rookie of Target Competition, Bertonelli himself (ranked ninth) and Daniel Gregor, another TDE standard bearer and Scholarship Program junior rounding out the top-10.
The young Dutchman Flynt Schuring actually finished in the top-10, but the Fulgenzi Racing standard-bearer was penalized 5 seconds for abuse of track limits and fell to 13th position. also behind the Australian Bayley Hall (BeDriver) and the Brescian Pietro Armanni (Prima Ghinzani), while the first two points of Nicholas Pujatti are also noteworthy, making his absolute debut (in a not at all easy weekend) in motor racing with Villorba Racing.
The Michelin Cup also experienced many brawls during race 1. Luca Pastorelli managed to contain the various attacks of his direct rivals until the finish line, where he celebrated his second victory of the weekend with the first mini-breakaway in the championship. As in race 1, Francesco Fenici is again second behind him, chasing the top in his first season with Raptor Engineering.
Fenici took advantage of the duels that gradually took Gianluca Giorgi (BeDriver), Alex De Giacomi (Tsunami RT, who is also under investigation for a contact) and Stefano Stefanelli (Team MalucellI) out of contention for the podium, a factor that it also favored the comeback of Alberto De Amicis.
After yesterday’s disappointment, when the Ebimotors standard bearer was forced to stop due to a “knock” on Steven Giacon resulting in an 8-place penalty on the race 2 grid, the driver from Guidonia recovered up to the final third place, managing to celebrate the first podium of the season which sees him defend the 2023 title.
Having said that, in addition to Simone Iaquinta, among the most anticipated protagonists, the two-time French champion Marvin Klein also sadly ended race 2 in the pits (a contact with Festante was reported in the chaos that broke out in turn 3 at the start, but it could also be a subsequent problem) , the possibility of revenge will come in the next round of the Carrera Cup Italia, which will be held in Imola on the weekend of June 2nd.
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