UpdateF1 >> Formula 1 News > A1GP: Round 1

Malaysia and France win

The build-up to the forth season of A1GP was dominated by the new Powered by Ferrari cars. However production problems have meant that several of the top teams, including Team Germany, Team Great Britain, Team Mexico, Team India and Team Canada are missing, while several others only just mad it to Zandvoort.

The original calendar showed the opening round to be at Mugello two weeks ago, but was cancelled due to the production problems; however seventeen of the twenty-three scheduled nations were able to race at Zandvoort.

The schedule was run to different rules to usual. Rather than a rookie session to open the weekend, Saturday morning consisted of two free practise sessions for the regular race drivers. In the first of these Jeroen Bleekemolen set the fastest time at home for Team Netherlands. Adam Carroll was second for Team Ireland with newcomer Earl Bamber third for Team New Zealand. During this session twelve drivers set times.

Bleekemolen was fastest again in practise session two. Neel Jani was second for reigning champions Team Switzerland, who only received a car it was donated by Team Pakistan after driver Adam Kahn was too tall to fit safely. Third in this session was Carroll as thirteen drivers set times.

Qualifying has be kept in four separate segments for 2008/2009 season but the time limit has been reduced from fifteen minutes to just ten minutes, however in Zandvoort that was forgotten and qualifying was competed in a old-style Formula One session, with one hour and unlimited laps to help teams get better knowledge of the car.

Team Malaysia driver Fairuz Fauzy, who topped both preseason tests was the first out on the track quickly followed by Adam Carroll in the Team Ireland car. Carroll very quickly proved how quick the new car is when he set a time of 1m 28.012s on his first attempt breaking Adrian Zaugg’s lap record of 1m 28.353.

Bleekemolen went even faster on his opening lap beating the new record by just under three seconds.

Just fifteen minutes into the session we witnessed the first of two red flags. It was for Jin Woo Hwan in the Team Korea car. He spun into the tyre barrier at turn ten. The marshals recovered the car and he was able to continue later in qualifying.

Under red flag conditions the clock kept ticking down the hour and so when the track went green again a further seven minutes had been wasted.

Once Carroll got up to speed he was able to beat Bleekemolen’s time to take provisional pole. At that half way point he was fastest, from Bleekemolen and Fabio Onidi who had got the Team Italy car into third place.

South Africa had struggled in the early part of the session, much was expected of them as Adrian Zaugg had won at Zandvoort in each of the last two A1GP seasons. He improved slightly on his time to move into seventh place.
Fauzy was looking strong as he beat Bleekemolen's early benchmark to go second behind Carroll, but it did not last long as Bleekemolen blitzed both drivers to move back ahead.

The second red flag of the session was to clear up the Team Australia car after John Martin crashed into the wall and damaged the nose. This red flag lasted lass than two minutes and the session resumed with just seven minutes to go.

After this red flag Felipe Albuquerque finally got the Team Portugal car out on track for the first time this season with just less than ten minutes to go. His first attempt left him fifteenth and last.

Champions Team Switzerland were having a quiet session but jumped into fourth place late on, but their thunder was stolen by the debutants. New team, Team Monaco with Clivio Piccione at the wheel shocked everybody by moving into a provisional third place, and then new driver Earl Bamber put the Team New Zealand car in to second place

Bleekemolen chose to watch the final banzai laps from his rivals sure that he was safe in pole position.

All the drivers had another lap but were unable to touch Bleekemolen, the only improvement was Carroll who moved up into third place, ahead of Fauzy as Bleekemolen and Bamber locked out the front row.

The rain was so hard at the start of the sprint race the stewards had mo option but to start the race behind the safety car.

The was drama before the race even began as Albuquerque managed to spin his car into the gravel on his way to the grid, he rejoined the circuit and was able to start.

After three laps behind the safety car the race began.

Bleekemolen, who knows Zandvoort like the back of his hand in all conditions was trying to break away at the front of the field but he was taking Bamber along with him, the young New Zealander showing some impressive skills in the wet.

Daniel Morad had a spin at the first corner of lap four and only just avoided hitting Charlie Kimball in the Team USA car.

There were cars going off the road on every lap. Lap five Hwan and Martin ended up in the gravel after the Korean hit the Australian. The incident was placed under investigation by the stewards.

On lap seven, Bamber got a run of Bleekemolen through Tarzan and used this tow to attempt a move around the outside at the chicane. Bleekemolen tried to hold his position but ran wide giving Bamber all the time needed to slip underneath and take the lead.

Fauzy was the man on the move, on lap eight he took third place from Jani and set after Bleekemolen, eventually passing around the same lap and moving into second.

Loic Duval took third from Jani when the Swiss driver made a mistake and then passed Bleekemolen who was now struggling with the conditions.

Up front Fauzy had caught Bamber and on lap nine made the pass stick, he then pulled away to claim victory.

Ho-Pin Tung was looking good for Team China, despite the team missing both practice sessions and qualifying he was up to fifth place, before a spin dropped him down the order.

On lap twelve the race was stopped due to the poor conditions.

Behind the front three, Bleekemolen held on to fourth from Jani who was putting huge pressure on the Dutchman, and would have passed if the race had run its full distance.

Behind them Zaugg was sixth, Onidi seventh, Kimball eighth, Albuquerque ninth and Morad tenth. That tenth place claimed the first point in A1GP history for Team Lebanon at the sixty-sixth attempt

After the early stopping of the sprint race due to the conditions, the stewards made the decision that the feature race will start under the safety car.

After to laps the safety car pulled in and Fauzy held his lead from Bamber. Early in the race both Kimball and Tung spun.

Jani developed a problem with his car and the champions were forced to pull into the pits and retirement after only five laps.

On lap six, Onidi made a mistake and took out Zaugg, causing both Team Italy and Team South Africa to retire.

By lap seven Fauzy had opened out a 2.4 second lead over Duval in second and Bleekemolen in third place.

The pit window, for the first of two mandatory pit stops, opened on lap eight and on lap nine Fauzy pitted early but had a problem undoing all his hard work at the start of the race.

He was not the only one to have problems changing tyres. Bleekemolen also had problems and lost time.

Duval had taken the lead after Fauzy’s pit stop and when he made his pit stop on lap fifteen, it was a good one and they were able to stay ahead.

Disaster for the home nation occurred on lap sixteen as Bleekemolen was forced into retirement with an electrical problem, they were able to fix the problem and get the car running again.

Albuquerque suffered a big accident forcing the safety car to be deployed. The cars bunched up on lap seventeen with Duval leading Fauzy and Bamber as the top three.

The race restarted on lap eighteen with just nine cars still running. Hwan, who had earlier spun off restarted the race to become the tenth team running, guaranteeing them some points on their debut.

Duval was the man on the pace, pulling out a 4.6 second lead in just three laps before the second pit window opening on lap twenty-two.

Morad was running fourth, representing Team Lebanon’s best ever race. He had a spin and lost fourth to Martin but it was still their best ever race.

Fauzy was again the first to pit for the second time, he was catching Duval at the time. Two laps later Bamber made his second stop but could not beat Fauzy, with Team Malaysia retaining second place.

Just a lap after Bamber, Duval made his second stop, it went without a hitch and he was able to maintain his lead, and with just nine minutes to go before the time limit he just had to keep it on the road to take his own personal feature race win.

Kimball spun out on lap thirty-one dropping him to tenth place, meaning that despite ending his race in the gravel Team USA will still get a championship point.

The race ended under the safety car when Morad spun, collected Tung and sent both cars crashing at high speed into the barriers. The time limit was reached after thirty-five laps.

Behind the safety car, Duval took the win, Fauzy was second, Bamber third, Martin fourth, Bleekemolen fifth, Piccione sixth and Hwan seventh both great results for the debuting teams. Morad was classified eighth with Tung ninth and Kimball tenth despite none of the final three running at the end.

In the championship Team France and Team Malaysia share the lead with twenty-two points each, Team New Zealand are third with eighteen and Team Netherlands fourth with eleven.

During the first event of the season three teams scored their first ever A1GP points: Team Lebanon, Team Monaco and Team Korea. The question is will they be able to repeat it in Chengdu, China when the six teams that missed the Zandvoort event are back on the grid?

Written: Sun, 05 Oct 2008 21:06:45