Carl Bennett and Tommaso Mosca took their second win of the season in Saturday’s race at the Red Bull Ring.
The Thai-Italian pair, in their AF Corse Ferrari 296, put in a perfect performance to beat the GetSpeed Mercedes of Fabian Schiller and Anthony Bartone at the end of a very lively race, with Mosca winning the final duel with Bartone on the final lap, after a great performance by both drivers.
Local heroes Simon Reicher and Christopher Haase in the Eastalent Racing Audi took third and, most importantly, reclaimed the lead in the standings, thanks also to the fact that Levente Révész and Max Götz finished out of the points, due to a first-lap contact and puncture.
Haase-Reicher now has 102 points, three more than Révész and 15 than Bennett & Mosca.
Ferrari also won in Pro-Am thanks to Austrian outfit Baron Motorsport, with Edoardo Bacci and Philipp Baron beating the ISR Racing Audi of Libor Milota-Filip Salaquarda and the pole-setting Racing Trevor BMW of Atila Zsigo-Max Hesse.
In Am, the Garage 59 McLaren of Mark Sansom, together with former double class champion Marco Pulcini, took its fourth win of the season and is now equal on points the #21 AF Corse Ferrari.
Max Hesse became the eighth different poleman this season, at the wheel of the Racing Trevor BMW. The German had an excellent start but still had to concede P1 for a short while, up to corner 3, to Lebbon, recovering it shortly afterwards. Schiller was third ahead of Basz, Baumann, and Rattican.
There was contact between Müller and Kizilov at turn 1, with the Russian spinning and the Swiss stopping shortly after. Götz also had contact and a puncture, slowing considerably and causing Sansom to spin. The safety car was deployed on lap 2 for two laps to recover the Mercedes of Müller.
At the restart, Hesse kept the advantage on Lebbon, with Basz third ahead of Schiller, Rattican, Baumann, and Klingmann. At this stage it was the young Brit shining as he took fourth from Schiller, who dropped behind Baumann and Bennett.
The action continued with Lebbon dropping down the order due to a slow puncture.
By lap 15, two laps before the pit stop window opened, Hesse had a 5-second gap on Rattican, with Basz and Baumann following closely, then Klingmann, Bennett, Schiller, Baumann, Baron, and Rugolo, first in Am. Reicher was 14th, and Götz 20th ahead of Lebbon.
After all stops were completed, Zsigo led by 11 seconds from Jedlinski, followed by Bartone, Pierburg, Kelly and Bacci.
While in the lead, Zsigo was holding well, Bartone took second ahead of Kelly, with Jedlinski fourth, followed by Bacci, Mosca, Pierburg and Haase. Only on lap 39 would Bartone pass Zsigo for the lead with Mosca leading the chase behind them.
In an exciting final couple of laps, Mosca attacked Bartone, who resisted almost perfectly and only conceded P1 on the very last lap, at turn 3, while Haase snatched third from Kelly, also a few yards from the flag.
Behind followed Bacci, Salaquarda and Zsigo, i.e. the top three in Pro-Am, while a late spin for Forgione left the win in Am to Pulcini, ahead of Kell and Naran.
