Difference between revisions of "2011 Supercup South African Grand Prix"

Revision as of 11:57, 25 June 2011

  2011 Supercup South African Grand Prix

Race details
2011 Supercup season
200px
Date	May 4th, 2011
Official name	2011 Supercup South African Grand Prix
Location	Kyalami South Africa
Course	Permanent Racing Facility 2.647 mi / 4.261 km
Distance	38 laps, 100.586 mi / 161.198 km
Weather	Sunny
Pole position
Driver	Bart De Vos	Malta Force GP
Time	1:19.381
Fastest Lap
Driver	Bart De Vos	Malta Force GP
Time	1:20.117
Podium
First	Bart De Vos	Malta Force GP
Second	Lewis Redshaw	Nordsjoen Racing
Third	David Jundt	Nijo Racing

The 2011 Supercup South Grand Prix was the 5th race of the 2011 Supercup season and was won by Bart De Vos.

Report

Round 5 of the 2011 GPVWC Supercup season brought us to the tricky track of Kyalami in South Africa. After a week off, the drivers were eager to get going again and we had a new face in the form of Teemu Toikka in PB Racing, hoping to show everyone what he can do.

Qualifying showed no surprises as Bart De Vos took pole position, but qualifying was much closer than a lot of people had expected. Sam Millar and Lewis Redshaw, star of the last race after winning on his debut, were within 2 tenths of the Malta Force GP star. Pavel Loknovski and David Jundt rounded out the top 5, who were the only people to turn laps in under the 1.20 mark. Qualifying was marred by an odd incident involving the server, where several drivers disconnected, however they all rejoined without problems.

During the formation lap, Bart De Vos caused his team a huge scare by going off and brushing against a wall in the final sector, but luckily no damage was taken and he could continue to the grid. Teemu Toikka, on his debut, took some time getting into his grid slot and this caused the lights to take some extra time in coming on but they did in the end and the race got under way. The young Finn caused a stir by slamming into the back of Mal McKee due to a good start by the newcomer and a sluggish one by Northern Irish. Investigation was undertook but no action was taken. Further on into the lap, an incident occurred between Nikos Evangelidakis and Adam Smith but this was also deemed a racing incident. Adam Smith retired with suspension troubles on the first lap.

Pavel Loknovski made the most of a good start from himself and a ok one from two cars ahead to end up in 2nd place at the end of the first lap with De Vos leading. As the race started to settle down, Lewis Redshaw spun whilst attempting an overtaking move on Loknovski for 2nd. This dropped him down to 6th place. On lap 5, Sam Millar made a critical mistake, spinning and losing his front wing which cost him many places and put his push for the win at risk. He would then continue the race down in 16th and fight back from there. These problems allowed De Vos and Loknovski to build a decent 8 second gap back to an unusually off the pace Jason Muscat in 3rd place. Dan Rusu's engine blew early on, ending the Woods Racing driver's race very prematurely. Mal McKee and Luke McKee both ran out of fuel on track within a few laps of each other.

On Lap 11, Samuli Leinonen of Nordsjoen Racing made a mistake coming into Turn 4 and couldn't help but put it in the wall ending his race. On Lap 16, Georgios Davakos made a mistake which caused him to lose both his front wing and rear wing. Whilst defending from Christoph Lichtenstein who had caught him up, Davakos again went off track. As he came back onto the track, Sam Millar had nowhere to go and collected the Water Blue Racing driver. On the next lap, Redshaw and Loknovski were disputing 2nd place when Loknovski made a small mistake which gave the Nordsjoen driver a slipstream. As the TDR driver turned in, Redshaw went for a gap that consequently closed. The RDs looked into the incident which ended Loknovski's race but it was concluded to be a racing incident.

After all the pitstops had been made, the order settled down. As the race went on, more and more people fell victim to the demanding Kyalami track, with only 11 of the 20 starters eventually finishing the race. Sam Millar crashed, ending what was a tough day for the Scot who rued losing another 25 points to De Vos. Toikka, who had a poor showing on his debut, eventually crashed out towards the end after struggling through most of the race. In the final laps, David Jundt and Liam Hatchell disputed the final podium position. On the very last lap, Hatchell fell off the track allowing Jundt to slip up the inside and take the final position on the podium. Bart De Vos won his 3rd race of the season, extending his lead in the championship over Gregg Lawson to 12 points. Lewis Redshaw came through to finish 2nd, with David Jundt rounding off the podium. Hatchell ended up 4th with Muscat in 5th, lower than maybe he was expecting. Lawson, who it turned out had been struggling with a damaged suspension for much of the race, finished in 6th with the reigning Supercup champion Lichtenstein in 7th. Ihab Abbas, who had a rather quiet race, ended 8th with Chris Williamson finishing 9th. Final 2 finishers were Nikos Evangelidakis and Robert Rose.

In the drivers championship, Bart de Vos extended his lead over Lawson to 12 points. Lawson moved above Loknovski, who fell to 3rd after his DNF. Redshaw and Jundt shared 4th with 27 points each, although it is worth noting that Redshaw had only competed in 2 races at the time. Hatchell and Muscat also made up places whilst Millar, Leinonen and Davakos paid the price for their DNFs by dropping places. Ihab Abbas moved above Mal McKee whilst Christoph Lichtenstein moved above the absent Ben Morgan. Malta Force had a good showing and took the lead of the constructors championship from Nordsjoen Racing and had a small gap of 4 points. Nijo Racing lay in 3rd albeit over 20 points back from 2nd place. They leapfrogged Woods who slipped to 4th. Other movers in the constructors are CP Lotus who took 10th place from Mineral GP who fell to 11th.

Classification

Qualifying

Race

Standings after the Race