AFR Championship water-testing race at ZIC

The AFR championship 2010 water-testing race was held at Zhuhai International Circuit (ZIC) last weekend. AFR featured 7 new faces & 12 cars from Asia Racing Team (ART), Champ Motorsport, PTRS racing team, Top Speed racing team and FRD racing team.

Saturday Qualifying: The 15 year-old Thai grabbed pole

The qualify session started at 9:30 a.m. When most of the cars roared into their 4 th lap, the tire temperature got better and so did the laptimes, as Stuvik set 1:38.2 at his 4 th try. Ferigutti set 1:37.5 to take the lead 3 laps later. Rainey He set 1:38.7 in lap 6 climbing to P5. It was clear that Stuvik felt the pressure from Ferigutti and pushed his best lap to 1:37.564. In the end, Stuvik grabbed pole, Ferigutti 2 nd . Zhicong Li set 1:38.0 confirming his 2 nd row position for the afternoon race, while Sritrai qualified 4 th . Shanqi Zhang, another young driver from PTRS, qualified 5 th and Rainey He from FRD Racing team, qualified 6 th setting 1:38.4 at his last try.

Saturday Round 1: Stuvik turned pole to winner

The first round started at 13:15. The temperature was certainly high enough to bring out good performance from the Kumho tires. Ferigutti got off to a good start holding the inner line entering Turn 1 with almost half body lead. Stuvik late braked into T1 to keep the lead. Lap 4, Stuvik & Ferigutti established a clear lead. Lap 6, Samin Briceno stopped on the track when driving from T7 to T9. Safety car was sent. 2 laps later, Stuvik & Ferigutti managed to lead the fleet at the restart with Zhicong Li & Shanqi Zhang following 1 second behind. Zhang managed to overtake his teammate Li from the inside, which caused Li dropping from 3 rd to 8 th .

In the end, Stuvik from ART won and his teammate Ferigutti finished 2 nd . Shanqi Zhang from PTRS was 3 rd , with stability shown. Tin Sritrai was 4 th while Rainey He (FRD racing team) finished 5 th .

Sunday Round 2: Ferigutti claimed the top spot

Round 2 started at 4:50 p.m. under cloudy weather. As the lights went off, Ferrigutti led the fleet to Turn 1 while pole-sitter Sandy Stuvik suffered wheel-spin during start and lost his position. Car No.9 Zhicong Li overtook 4 cars when entering T1 and moved to position 5. Accident happened at T1, several cars hard braked & spun there. Red flag was shown & safety car was sent. Three cars retired from the race: Rainey He, Samin Briceno and Sunny Wong.

Lap 1, Car No.3 Sritrai overtook 2 cars under red and took 30 seconds penalty afterwards, while car No. 8 Shanqi Zhang jump-started and received 30 seconds' penalty.

The fleet did rolling start with Ferigutti the lead, Tin Sritrai 2 nd , Shanqi Zhang 3 rd and pole-sitter Stuvik dropped to 4 th . Shanqi Zhang overtook Sritrai after 1 lap. Chang, the Malaysian, overtook his teammate Victor Yung at restart lap. Lap 7, top 3 cars started a good fight, Zhang closed the gap to 0.7 seconds while Ferigutti did a good job defending his lead; Stuvik followed Zhang 0.5 sec behind. The 10-lap race finished as Ferigutti, Zhang, Stuvik, Sritrai, Chang and Zhicong Li the top 6 finishers. According to the official result after all the penalties, Ferigutti won with Stuvik 2 nd and Chang 3 rd in International Class. As for the Asian class, Stuvik, Chang and Li were the top 3.

Paul Hui, the AFR project director, said:” It was a pleasure to have our first 2010 AFR race in this weekend. Under the unexpected circumstances and delay happened in the last few months, we proved that with all the hard works contributed by all parties especially from the teams, we can get this done. The Sunday race was full of ups and downs but I just want to compliment the race control and the steward group to keep the race under very good control and made the necessary decision based on the regulation published. It also demonstrated fully my intention outlined since last year that promoter will stay impartial and allow the teams to compete in a fair manner. I also want to encourage the young drivers to absorb this good experience and use them for the benefit of their racing career. The official championship will start next month in Zhuhai and I look forward to seeing them soon.”

Mr. Paul Hui, the AFR project director, said:” It was a pleasure to have our first 2010 AFR race in this weekend. Under the unexpected circumstances and delay happened in the last few months, we proved that with all the hard works contributed by all parties especially from the teams, we can get this done. The Sunday race was full of ups and downs but I just want to compliment the race control and the steward group to keep the race under very good control and made the necessary decision based on the regulation published. It also demonstrated fully my intention outlined since last year that promoter will stay impartial and allow the teams to compete in a fair manner. I also want to encourage the young drivers to absorb this good experience and use them for the benefit of their racing career. The official championship will start next month in Zhuhai and I look forward to seeing them soon.”

For more info please go to FRDwebsite:www.frdsports.com