FIA GT Championship – Dubai – Race Report
Lamy Thriller Sets Up Bahrain Showdown Next Week
Aston Martin Looked Secure For The Win Until….

Had this one run its course and finished as the top six looked on lap 78 of 89, it would actually have been less close at the top of the GT1 driver points going into next week’s last race of the season. But the late retirement of the Russian Age / Dubai GT Team / Middle East Aston Martin Aston Martin (of Bouchut and Ortelli) eventually produced a win (rather than second) for Pedro Lamy and Gabriele Gardel in the #11 Larbre Ferrari, and that maximum score leaves Gardel on 70 points, level with Scheider and Bartels in the #9 Maserati, and one point behind Wendlinger and Bertolini in the #15 MC12.

Bahrain could be very special indeed: Dubai was an FIA GT thriller anyway.

We left Pedro Lamy yesterday pointing out that the Larbre Ferrari 550 wasn’t quite ‘au point’ in the final session of the day, after its engine change at lunchtime. He suggested that if the Larbre crew could provide him with a car just as he likes it, well, anything was possible – even from the back of the grid.

He was right.

At the front, Christophe Bouchut led them away in the DBR9, from Mike Hezemans in the C5-R, then the four Maseratis, with their various ballast weights. Andrea Montermini was next up in the #3 GC 575, with Justin Keen eighth, and about to produce the best Lister performance of the season. Lamy and Piccini (in the GPC #2) were hurtling up from the back, together, and by lap 5 they were 12th and 13th, both lapping in the 1:57s, while Bouchut was the only man in the 1:56s. Lamy was 28 seconds down on the DBR9 at this stage. Bouchut had pulled out six seconds on Mike Hezemans, which eased out to nine, five laps later – by which time the front two had slipped into the 1:59s. As a result, Lamy had cut the gap to the Aston Martin – and it was 24 seconds, and dropping.

We’d already lost, or were about to lose, the #5 Konrad Saleen (driveshaft) and the #3 GPC Ferrari (retired in its garage), but Piccini was holding up GPC honours, right behind the Lister at 15 laps – by which time Bouchut’s lead to Hezemans was shrinking. The top nine (Piccini was ninth) looked very well matched at this point – except for Lamy. He set his first 1:56 and something lap on the 15th tour, and he’d set many more of them before his two stints were over. 1:58s was more or less the norm for the others at this stage.

What about the Maseratis then? At 20 laps, Bertolini was third, 15 seconds behind Bouchut, with Babini and Peter on his tail – but Lamy had already picked one of them off, Scheider in #9, and was right behind Peter’s #16. Passing Scheider would be good practice for later on. Eighth and ninth were Piccini and Keen, just over half a minute behind the blue Aston, while the rest of the GT1s (#4 Saleen, #12 Ferrari 550, #18 Ferrari 550) were over a minute down and out of the real race.

Laps 23, 24 and 25 were pretty special for Lamy, Leconte and Gardel – the Portuguese picked off Maseratis on each of these consecutive laps (Peter, Babini then Bertolini), and he was suddenly third, 17 seconds behind Bouchut, 12 behind Hezemans. Justin Keen was doing wonders for Laurence Pearce’s 2005, matching the leader for lap after lap. There, he was right – the big man said his car was as good as anything out there.

But not as quick as the Lamy-550 combination: Pedro was really on a charge, ripping off 1:56s lap after lap, bringing the gap to the Corvette down from 10 seconds to seven, five, two and then 12 hundredths of a second on lap 30, by which time Bouchut had already pitted, so Lamy was second. He didn’t lead across the line though (yet), pitting after 31 laps – slowly.

"We think there was some fuel in the tank, but it was not picked up,” said Lamy later. “It made it more exciting, didn't it?"

So suddenly that journey from back to front now included a trip backwards, to the tune of a minute. Hezemans pitted for Longin to take over (32 laps from the economical Corvette), and the Belgian was on track ahead of Ortelli – who was finding 1:56 a pleasant pace in the DBR9, and soon (lap 38) passed Longin and pulled away.

The #16 Maserati was already a lap down, thanks to slow laps by one of Philipp Peter’s partners, so at 40 laps, approaching half way, Ortelli led Longin by five seconds, then came Bartels in the first of the MC12s (13 secs behind Longin), then Wendlinger in #15 and Biagi in #10. The GPC 575 was back up ahead of the Larbre 550, Gardel still that minute behind Ortelli.

Gardel deserves to be in contention for the title after his drive in the middle of the race: he held the gap at 60 seconds, and even brought it down towards the end of the second hour, passing #2 as he did so. His best laps were the in the 1:57s, the best of them a 1:57.6.

A Safety Car period neatly coincided with the need for a second pit stop (this was a straightforward, two stop race) – a couple of the lesser GT2s having stopped on the track. Some confusion in picking up the leader was sorted out, so that when they went racing again, Bouchut led Kumpen, the three Maseratis (9, 15 and 10 being four, seven and 34 seconds behind the Aston Martin), then Lamy another four seconds back. Pedro would have to repeat his first stint – but how far could he move up in the remaining 28 laps?

16 of the 28 were accomplished by #11 in under 1:57 – but initially, Bouchut was lapping in a similar pace. The Maseratis weren’t though, and Babini was the first victim (lap 65). Lap 67 and Lamy set the best lap of the race (1:56.015), but Bertolini was still 20 seconds ahead. Not for long though: by lap 75 the gap was just four seconds, and on lap 77, Lamy was fourth. Bouchut’s lead over Kumpen had been 20 seconds, but Scheider demoted the Corvette, so on lap 78 the order was:

Bouchut
Scheider –21
Kumpen –22
Lamy –25
Bertolini –28
Babini –42.

A lap later, Scheider was the race leader: Bouchut was out with no drive on the Aston Martin. Lamy could win this. He hunted down the Corvette’s small margin, and took second on lap 82 – at which point Scheider was five seconds up the road. Not for long, a few more 1:56s and the gap was nine-tenths on lap 85 (four to go), then six-tenths, then two-tenths.

On the penultimate lap, Lamy passed Scheider (between turns 13 and 14), and that was it – a third win for the Larbre Ferrari.

"It's a miracle," reckoned Team Principal Jack Leconte. "Sometimes the team has to make up for a driver's mistake, but today the driver made up for the team's mistake, a bad one. The car was perfect, the drivers did everything possible to win, and now we have a real chance to win the title for Gabriele next weekend in Bahrain."

At least Michael Bartels saw his Vitaphone outfit take the GT1 Teams’ title, but perhaps his expression on the podium says more about Maserati weight penalties than anything else.

Bartels: "It was one of the most exciting races we have seen in the FIA GT Championship. Considering that we are carrying 150kg of handicap and FIA weight, I think that the car is still performing. I did not expect to finish in second position. I have to thank Pirelli and Maserati for delivering very (well) performing material. I also have to thank the young structure of Vitaphone Racing Team which achieved a great goal to win the GT1 Teams Championship in its first season. We will have an incredible finale with a very close point standing in the Drivers' Championship and we should all look forward to the race in Bahrain."

In GT2, things went the way of the #88 GruppeM Porsche for a change. Lieb and Collard were nose to tail early on, pulling way clear of the rest (led by the Ebimotors Porsche), but a quick spin for Emmanuel Collard dropped him a few seconds back towards the end of the first hour.

The order was still #66 (Rockenfeller) ahead of #88 (Sugden) at the start of the second hour – but it was soon curtains for the championship winner (a water leak), Sugden and Collard going on to win unchallenged, the latter taking his second major win in six days.

Tim Sugden: "We were so far in the lead that it was just the case of being careful with the car and not making any mistakes. It was easy really. We will take any win anywhere we can get it. With Mike and Marc having won the Championship, and with 5 races won each, the only thing we can hold onto is that we want to win one more race than them."

That left the second spot on the podium to the Spyker, making up for last Sunday’s disappointment in Istanbul, and the Dutch car was well ahead of the next GT2 home, the JMB Ferrari 360. The G2 and G3 winners were… the only cars to start in those two classes.

GT1 Driver Points
1 Karl Wendlinger / Andrea Bertolini 66 + 5 = 71
3 Timo Scheider / Michael Bartels 62 + 8 = 70
Gabriele Gardel 60 + 10 = 70 (right)
6 Thomas Biagi / Fabio Babini 59 + 4 = 63
8 Pedro Lamy 45 + 10 = 55
9 Anthony Kumpen / Bert Longin / Mike Hezemans 40 + 6 = 46

Driver Comments (with thanks to Jacquie Groom and her team for the usual supply of excellent material throughout the event)
Gabriele Gardel: “I did the middle stint, which was good. We were quick enough to reduce the gap with the other Maserati cars, and then, we were lucky because we got the safety car, which helped keeping the leading cars compact. I have to thank Pedro for his wonderful race at the end and the team, which did not make any mistakes. You have to be proud of being in this team. It is the second year in a row that I have won on this circuit. We came here competing for the title and I am just one point behind the leading drivers in the classification. Everything is still open until the last race of the Championship. I would like to share this moment with Pedro”.

Michael Bartels: “First of all, I would like to excuse my team mate Timo Scheider who is on his way to Malaysia for tomorrow’s qualifying in the A1 Grand Prix Series. Today, he drove two very good stints. It was one of the most exciting races we saw in the FIA GT Championship. When you look at the first stint, all the Maserati cars were together with the Corvette while the Aston Martin was pulling away. Pedro [Lamy] was storming from the back. When looking at the lap times, you could expect the n° 11 would be fighting for the victory, which happened. Considering that we are carrying 150kg of handicap and FIA weight, I think that the car is still performing. I did not expect to finish in second position. I have to thank Pirelli and Maserati for delivering very performing material. I also have to thank the young structure of Vitaphone Racing Team which achieved a great goal to win the GT1 Teams Championship in its first season. We will have an incredible finale with a very close point standing in the Drivers Championship and we should all look forward to the race in Bahrain”.

Mike Hezemans: We couldn’t keep up with the Aston Martin at the beginning. When there was sand on the track, we lost a bit of speed. But when he was about ten seconds away, the tyres and the car were really perfect, and just at the end we just missed out a little bit as all the cars came back out on the track with new tyres. We were a little bit unlucky with the safety car but that’s racing !”

Bert Longin: “I did the middle stint and it was very important for me to keep second place. I was looking at the times and my direct competitors were 5 to 7 seconds behind me. We were unlucky with the safety car as we were probably one of the only cars which could manage the race with two pit stops. In my stint, I pushed the drink button on my steering wheel but the spray of water came out of my helmet. For one lap, I could not see too much as in fact, it was raining in the car ! Finally, I gave the car back in the second position so I was happy”

Anthony Kumpen: “It was close at the end as I was fighting with three cars ! But in fact, we only set the 8th fastest time in the race, so we were not really on pace during the race... By finishing third, we can say that the team did a great job. We did the fastest pit stops in the race and won 8 seconds in the second pit stop ! In Bahrain, the other cars will have more success ballast, so we hope to finish with a win!”

Christophe Bouchut: “It is a pity, as I am still chasing my first win of the season, and now there is only one race left. We had a good lead – it’s true that we had a good car and we are two good drivers in the car so that was an advantage, but something broke – we don’t know what exactly yet. But it’s disappointing, although it’s true that we are not fighting for the Championship. Still, after our problems in Zhuhai, and now this with only eight laps to go, you begin to wonder. We have everything in place to win, so we’ll have to wait for Bahrain. I have a slight advantage of having raced there in the GT Festival, and I am looking forward to going back.”

Emmanuel Collard: “We had a really close fight with the nr 66 car from the start. I was quickest at the start but then I made a mistake and braked too late. I lost the first place. I stayed behind Marc [Lieb] for the whole stint. It was a really good fight. Marc’s car had a water pump problem and had to retire. Our end of race was smooth”.

Donny Crevels: “Jeroen has just left for Malaysia to race in the A1 Grand Prix. We had an excellent race today. The team is working very hard for next year, trying to have another engine in order to be more competitive. We did a good race, we controlled it. We were lucky that the nr 66 Porsche retired. The second place was the best we could reach for this race”.

Prince Albert von Thurn und Taxis – nr 89 JMB Racing Ferrari 360 Modena, third in GT2: “It is my first podium in the FIA GT Championship and I am very happy with the result. My stint started well but it became scary when I flat-spotted a tyre. I struggled to get the car back to the pits. Then the safety car came out and we got stopped at the pit exit for a lap. It all went well in the end and we cannot complain”

Mauro Casadei: “I wish to thank JMB Racing who gave me the opportunity to race this competitive Ferrari 360 Modena as well as Chris and Albert for a fantastic weekend. My stint was not so good as we had a radio problem. I was afraid not to have enough fuel and for the last 40 minutes, I was going slowly, like a taxi driver. We had trouble with the tyres but then, here we are on the podium !”