UpdateF1 >> Formula 1 News > A1GP: Round 10

Jani wins championship for Switzerland

Round ten of ten of A1GP 2007-2008 was held in Brand Hatch, England. Going into the round Team Switzerland have 150 points and only need four to win the championship. Team New Zealand are second with 121 and can still win but Team France in third are now out of it with 111 points.

Team New Zealand started strongly and they did with Chris van der Drift topping the rookie session just 0.001 seconds ahead of Team Portugal’s Filipe Albuquerque, who in the week leading into this event had said that he will be back to win the title in 2008-2009. Third in the session was Filip Salaquarda for Team Czech Republic with the Great Britain rookie James Winslow in tenth place.

In the Friday official practice session Robbie Kerr topped the times on home soil for Team Great Britain. Cong Fu Cheng was second for Team China with Jonathan Summerton third for Team USA. In the championship battle; Neel Jani was fourth for Team Switzerland and Johnny Reid was eighth for Team New Zealand.

Cheng was again causing surprises on Saturday as he set the fastest time in the final practice session. Kerr was second 0.218 seconds slower with Narain Karthikeyan third for Team India. The two championship protagonists were next; Reid ahead of Jani this time.

In qualifying for the sprint race, Kerr delighted the home crowd by taking pole position on the track where he became the first home driver to win last year.

When the qualifying session began, after clearing up a wreckage from the previous race, Adam Khan was first out for Team Pakistan. After he had set his lap there was a long gap before anybody else set a time.

Karthikeyan was the next onto the track and went fastest, and with three minutes to go he was still fastest ahead of Salaquarda and John Martin for Australia.

With less than three minutes to go everybody went out together. At the end of it Jani set the fastest time after using new tyres. Kerr was second with Karthikeyan holding on to take a provisional third place.

It took until six minutes left for segment two to spring into life, starting with Eduardo Piscopo of Team Italy, Martin and Karthikeyan leading the first batch of runners.

Martin put the Team Australia car into eighth while Karthikeyan stayed third and became vulnerable to other cars behind him in the provisional standings.

Again everybody went out together in the dying seconds. Franck Montagny was first for Team France, improving his time to take fifth place.

Jani failed to improve on his time and then lost pole position when Kerr beat his lap to claim Team Great Britain’s first pole of the season. Jani also lost second place to Jonathan Summerton in the Team USA car, but he will line-up third with championship rival Reid in tenth place.

Feature race qualifying started slowly with Montagny the first out five minutes into the segment. He set fastest time followed by Salaquarda, Khan and Martin.

Five minutes to go the rest came out. Kerr went fastest again from Karthikeyan, Adrian Zaugg for Team South Africa in third.

The final segment started with Kerr on top looking to become the first nation to take the first double pole position on home soil.

In the fourth segment Martin set his time early after being blocked by David Martinez in the Team Mexico car. He only managed to improve into a disappointing sixteenth place.

Again into the last five minutes everybody came out. France went to third place before a series of drivers went top for a matter of only a few seconds.

Michael Ammermuller was first to take top spot for Team Germany before Adam Carroll for Team Ireland and Jani both went fastest within a minute.

But there was more to come, as Karthikeyan took his turn to sit on the top of the time sheets. Kerr was the last man to complete his lap, but it was not good enough as he could only go second between Karthikeyan and Jani.

In the championship battle, Jani will start the feature race third with Reid again struggling and starting way down the order in seventeenth.

The last sprint race of the season, as last year, was won on home soil by Robbie Kerr.

As the race started Kerr jumped into the lead ahead of Summerton, Carroll and Jani. Jani was in fourth place earning eight points and if he scored four of more Team Switzerland would be champions.

By mid race distance Kerr was still leading but his lead by about a second over Summerton and Jani was coming under pressure for Karthikeyan for fifth place.

On lap eleven Cheng was running fifteenth slowed dramatically and was passed by several cars. The reason became apparent on lap twelve when he sped up again and set the fastest lap to earn himself the extra point.

Kerr began to pull away from Summerton who was being attacked from behind by Carroll to try at get into second place.

He failed to get past and had to settle for third behind Summerton and race winner Kerr. Jani finished fourth to take the championship ahead of Karthikeyan fifth, Albuquerque sixth, Zaugg seventh, Reid eighth, Jeroen Bleekomolen ninth for Team Netherlands with Montagny tenth.

With Team Switzerland as champions; Team New Zealand now had to hold off an attack from Team Great Britain over second in the championship. After Kerr’s sprint race win the gap was just nine points.

The last race of the season was won by Karthikeyan with Kerr just behind denying him the chance to become the first driver to take a double home win, and missing out on second in the championship by just one point.

From the green light, Karthikeyan took the lead from pole from Kerr and Carroll who took second and third.

On lap four the safety car was deployed; it was due to a big accident involving Khan and Martin colliding on the back straight and both crashing into the wall. Xandi Negrao of Team Brazil was also involved in the incident as he pitted for a new nose.

After four laps the safety car came in and Karthikeyan held on to his lead for just one lap before both he and Carroll pitted. Team India had a slow pit stop but Karthikeyan was able to stay ahead.

Kerr was in on the next lap and due to Karthikeyan’s slow pit stop he was able to jump the Indian and take the lead of those who had stopped.

On lap thirteen Albuquerque was the only driver not to stop as therefore lead the race. Kerr was clear in second with a close battle between Karthikeyan and Carroll for third place.

Albuquerque made his stop on lap fifteen falling back to twelfth place, handing the lead back to Kerr.

The battle over second between Karthikeyan and Carroll was about to become a three way battle as Ammermuller was closing them down very quickly. In an attempt to pass, Carroll made contact with Karthikeyan which damaged his front wing and caused him to suffer a puncture. As a result Carroll dropped out of the points.

As the second pit stops approached Kerr, Karthikeyan and Ammermuller were still running 1-2-3 with just 2.7 seconds separating the three cars. All three pitted together on lap thirty-two.

This time Kerr had a slow stop and Karthikeyan left the pit lane first, with Kerr following. Back on the track the Indian car began to pull away.

Cheng had a turn leading as he pitted late, after his stop be rejoined in sixth place.

Ammermuller’s pursuit of Kerr for second place ended in the gravel on lap forty, as Kerr closed in on Karthikeyan as they battled for the lead.

With five laps to go, Karthikeyan still held the lead from Kerr. Albuquerque took seventh from Reid; meaning that if Kerr could win Team Great Britain would finish the championship second.

At the flag Karthikeyan had won for the second time this season, Kerr was second and Jani was third to increase his winning margin over the rest of the field.

Cheng was fourth, Montagny fifth, Bleekemolen sixth, Albuquerque seventh, Reid eighth, Piscopo ninth and Satrio Hermanto to score the first point of the season for Team Indonesia.

After ten rounds and twenty races Team Switzerland are the champions with 168 points. Their winning margin is forty-one points over Team New Zealand ending up with 127 just one ahead of Team Great Britain with 126.

With Team Indonesia scoring a point in the last race of the season, it means that once again it is only Team Lebanon that fail to score a point during the season. In fact they are still looking for their first point in A1GP history.

Written: Mon, 05 May 2008 10:47:22