2015 Singapore Grand Prix

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Flag of Singapore.png   2015 Singapore Grand Prix
Race details
Race 13 of the 2015 Superleague season
Marina Bay Street Circuit.png
Date 27th August, 2015
Official name 2015 Singapore Grand Prix
Location Marina Bay Street Circuit, Singapore
Course Temporary Street Circuit
3.15 mi / 5.069 km
Distance 61 laps, 192.150 mi / 309.235 km
Weather Clear
Pole position
Driver England Alex Cooper CSG Racing-Potentia
Time 1:38.213
Fastest Lap
Driver England Tom Parker CSG Racing-Potentia
Time 1:37.303 on lap 60
Podium
First England Alex Cooper CSG Racing-Potentia
Second England David Fidock Hawkeye-Potentia
Third Germany Florian Geier Nordsjoen-Martex

The 2015 Singapore Grand Prix was the thirteenth round of the 2015 Superleague season and took place around the artificially-lit streets of Singapore's Marina Bay on the 27th August 2015. It was the first time that the Singapore Grand Prix had been ran since 2012, however the race was dropped the following year.

Singapore saw by far the greatest race of attrition for the entire season, with less cars finishing than there were points to go around. Though 14 runners were classified in the end, only 13 actually crossed the finishing line. This was easily the lowest number of finishers and was a sharp contrast to the previous race at Monza when only two cars were not classified. As a result, points were only rewarded down to 14th place, one less than usual.

The race was also memorable for the way that CSG Racing bounced back from the shock departure of Lewis Redshaw; CSG driver Alex Cooper took pole and race win, while fastest lap went to his teammate Tom Parker. Parker had initially made way for Cooper a few races before but was reinstated in the team as a replacement for Redshaw.

Second in the race went to David Fidock in the Hawkeye. Crucially, Fidock, who needed to start outscoring championship leader Philipp Puschke if he was to make a serious bid to defend his championship, did just that. Puschke languished down in 8th, one lap down, after a torrid race after messing up his setup and having to nurse his engine all the way to the flag. It was a bad race for Vod:Bul in general, with Jernej Simoncic crashing out early on.

Third place went to Florian Geier in the Nordsjoen, at last scoring his first podium of the season, a reward for all of his hard work. Sadly for his teammate, Agustin Canapino was the first to retire, all but finishing off his own championship hopes.

Fourth went to the Red Archer of Fran Lopez, for the second race in succession, although his 4th at Italy was the result of a penalty. Also for the second race in succession, Lopez led the race for a period. Nonetheless, he dropped to sixth in the Driver's Championship behind race winner Cooper. The result also saw him become the highest-placed driver with no remaining mathematical chance to win the championship.

Fifth in the race was Parker; he was classified one and a half minutes behind teammate Cooper, though that half-a-minute was due to a technical penalty; the penalty did not cost him his position however and he was happy given the short notice he had been given to prepare with. Behind Cooper came Jason Muscat, the second of the Red Archers. They were now comfortably planted fifth in the table, ahead of Midnight Motorsport. It was by now a clear field of six top teams. Midnight were over a hundred points clear of seventh-placed Torrent.

Torrent were one of the unlucky teams in Singapore. Jordan Weekes made his return after missing two races and was running as high as 4th early in the race. Unfortunately, Weekes retired after being tapped into a spin by Eric Stranne while in 8th, midway through the race. Teammate Mindaugas Klumbis was out by lap 5.

As is often the case with high-attrition races, the smaller teams put in plucky performances and snatched some very valuable points. This was very important for the bottom-five teams, so called because they held the unfortunate distinction of being unable to outscore Target Racing, who had been missing for over six races. The only team not to benefit was Green Stripes Racing, as they lost both their cars during the race. As it happened, none of the bottom-five teams got both of their cars to the end of the race, but nowhere was this more painfully felt than at Woods Racing, when Sven de Vries retired from a tantalising 6th place with engine problems, less than 20 laps from the flag. The tragically unfortunate de Vries fell just short of making 75% race distance, which would have seen him classified and get a point for 15th place.

Woods still had Roy Schroten finish twelfth, though victory among the bottom-five went to Kernow as their man Mark Wicks finished a lap ahead in eleventh.

Kieran Ryan scored a personal victory simply by dragging his broken Phoenix to the finishing line, which is more than Kenney Lybeer managed, although the Nijo was classified ahead of Ryan. 2 points were the Irishman's reward; sadly they were to be both his and his team's final points in Superleague.

As was usual, the race saw a plethora of driver changes. Menno Klont, who had previously raced for Woods, was now racing for two Grands Prix at Hawkeye in place of Wopke Hoekstra. At Klont's Edonis team, the brightly-lit merry-go-round of ever-changing drivers shone particularly strongly in the Asian night, as the #69 horse appeared being ridden by none-other than Eric Stranne, who was presently galloping away with the Formula Challenge Championship. Stranne, who had attempted to make amends for his tap with Weekes, otherwise drove a storming race to 7th, Edonis' best result since Spain. Unfortunately, the #4 horse, usually ridden by Marcos Riffel, had broken off the ride and was missing in Singapore, making Stranne the only Edonis out there. This was in contrast to Torrent; Singapore would prove to be the last time both their cars took part in the same race; Klumbis would not return for the rest of the season.

Sven de Vries would have wished for more from his return for Woods, though it would not be until Abu Dhabi before he had another chance to improve on this. Mark Wicks would have been delighted with the outcome upon his return to Kernow; meanwhile his teammate for the race was Niels of the talented Brugman brothers, who followed on from Lars, who had finished 13th back at Portugal. Unfortunately Niels retired from the race. Tom van der Voort was now back in the Midnight for the remainder of the season, though he retired too. Lastly, but by no means least, Mikael Tuomaala had, like Redshaw, announced his retirement after the Italian Grand Prix. His successor in the Nijo was fellow Scandinavian Tobias Olsson. He also retired.

Classification

Qualifying

Pos. No. Driver Constructor Time Gap Grid
1 13 England Alex Cooper CSG Racing - Potentia 1:38.213
1
2 14 Germany Philipp Puschke Vod:Bul - Valiant 1:39.268 +1.054 2
3 1 England David Fidock Hawkeye - Potentia 1:39.515 +1.302 3
4 24 England Tom Parker CSG Racing - Potentia 1:39.733 +1.519 4
5 21 Spain Fran Lopez Red Archer - Valiant 1:39.774 +1.560 5
6 19 Argentina Agustin Canapino Nordsjoen - Martex 1:39.784 +1.571 6
7 88 England Jordan Weekes Torrent - Potentia 1:39.825 +1.611 7
8 27 Germany Florian Geier Nordsjoen - Martex 1:40.028 +1.815 8
9 8 United States Sven de Vries Woods - Trinity 1:40.109 +1.896 9
10 6 Malta Jason Muscat Red Archer - Valiant 1:40.476 +2.263 10
11 7 India Sandeep Chodha Midnight - Potentia 1:40.665 +2.452 11
12 25 Netherlands Tom van der Voort Midnight - Potentia 1:40.679 +2.465 12
13 15 Slovenia Jernej Simoncic Vod:Bul - Valiant 1:40.751 +2.538 13
14 99 Lithuania Mindaugas Klumbis Torrent - Potentia 1:40.787 +2.573 14
15 69 Sweden Eric Stranne Edonis - Valiant 1:41.511 +3.298 15
16 11 Wales Ben Horrill Green Stripes - Valiant 1:41.616 +3.403 251
17 5 Belgium Kenney Lybeer Nijo - Trinity 1:42.255 +4.041 16
18 83 Netherlands Niels Brugman Kernow - Trinity 1:43.049 +4.836 17
19 20 South Africa Dewald Nel Green Stripes - Valiant 1:43.457 +5.243 18
20 12 England Mark Wicks Kernow - Trinity 1:44.322 +6.109 19
21 9 Netherlands Roy Schroten Woods - Trinity 1:44.460 +6.246 20
22 45 Ireland Kieran Ryan Phoenix - Trinity 1:44.706 +6.492 21
23 10 Sweden Tobias Olsson Nijo - Trinity 1:45.524 +7.311 22
24 46 Finland Mikko Jakonen Phoenix - Trinity 1:47.426 +9.213 23
25 2 Netherlands Menno Klont Hawkeye - Potentia no time
24

Notes:

  • 1Ben Horrill had a combined 10-place grid penalty for previous transgressions, including a 5-place grid penalty for exiting and rejoining the qualifying session.

Race

Pos. No. Driver Constructor Laps Time/Retired Grid Pts.
1 13 England Alex Cooper CSG Racing - Potentia 61 42:39.788 1 25
2 1 England David Fidock Hawkeye - Potentia 61 +24.629 3 20
3 27 Germany Florian Geier Nordsjoen - Martex 61 +38.288 8 16
4 21 Spain Fran Lopez Red Archer - Valiant 61 +48.017 5 13
51 24 England Tom Parker CSG Racing - Potentia 61 +1:32.526 4 11
6 6 Malta Jason Muscat Red Archer - Valiant 61 +1:53.126 10 10
7 69 Sweden Eric Stranne Edonis - Valiant 60 +1 Lap 15 9
8 14 Germany Philipp Puschke Vod:Bul - Valiant 60 +1 Lap 2 8
9 7 India Sandeep Chodha Midnight - Potentia 60 +1 Lap 11 7
10 2 Netherlands Menno Klont Hawkeye - Potentia 59 +2 Laps 24 6
11 12 England Mark Wicks Kernow - Trinity 59 +2 Laps 19 5
12 9 Netherlands Roy Schroten Woods - Trinity 58 +3 Laps 20 4
132 5 Belgium Kenney Lybeer Nijo - Trinity 57 Accident 16 3
14 45 Ireland Kieran Ryan Phoenix - Trinity 55 +6 Laps 21 2
Ret 8 United States Sven de Vries Woods - Trinity 44 Engine 9
Ret 11 Wales Ben Horrill Green Stripes - Valiant 35 Accident 25
Ret 88 England Jordan Weekes Torrent - Potentia 29 Did not Finish 7
Ret 15 Slovenia Jernej Simoncic Vod:Bul - Valiant 17 Suspension 13
Ret 83 Netherlands Niels Brugman Kernow - Trinity 15 Accident 17
Ret 10 Sweden Tobias Olsson Nijo - Trinity 12 Suspension 22
Ret 25 Netherlands Tom van der Voort Midnight - Potentia 11 Accident 12
Ret 20 South Africa Dewald Nel Green Stripes - Valiant 6 Suspension 18
Ret 99 Lithuania Mindaugas Klumbis Torrent - Potentia 5 Did not Finish 14
Ret 46 Finland Mikko Jakonen Phoenix - Trinity 4 Suspension 23
Ret 19 Argentina Agustin Canapino Nordsjoen - Martex 1 Did not Finish 6

Notes:

  • 1Tom Parker had 30 seconds added to race time.
  • 2Kenney Lybeer was classified as finishing having completed 75% of race distance.

Standings after the race

Drivers' Championship standings
Pos Driver Points
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1 Germany Philipp Puschke 235
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2 England David Fidock 200
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3 England Lewis Redshaw 176
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4 Argentina Agustin Canapino 151
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5 England Alex Cooper 138

Constructors' Championship standings
Pos Constructor Points
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1 England Vod:Bul-Valiant 322
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2 England CSG Racing-Martex 293
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3 Norway Nordsjoen-Potentia 267
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4 England Hawkeye-Valiant 237
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5 Greece Red Archer-Potentia 203

  • Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of standings.

External links

Preceded by:
2015 Italian Grand Prix
GPVWC Superleague
2015 season
Succeeded by:
2015 Japanese Grand Prix
Preceded by:
2012 Singapore Grand Prix
Singapore Grand Prix
Succeeded by:
none