Harmony Racing’s #96 Ferrari scored its third GT World Challenge Asia victory of the season, keeping Liu Kaishun in overall title contention ahead of Sunday’s showdown in Shanghai.
David Chen Weian, who returned to the cockpit this weekend, took the chequered flag after his young co-driver passed pole sitter Akash Nandy at the start before controlling the opening stint.
The result also moved Liu to the head of the Silver standings as well as third overall. But his chances of winning one or both appear, in truth, highly unlikely given the 21-second success penalty he and Chen will serve in Race 2.
Lu Wei remains the favourite for outright and Pro-Am honours after Laurin Heinrich’s star turn helped their Origine Porsche complete the podium despite serving an additional 10 seconds during the pit stop. Lu’s lead over Huang Ruohan and Alessandro Ghiretti has therefore increased from five to 14 points with 25 available for winning tomorrow. The Absolute Porsche must now finish no lower than third to have any hope of overturning its deficit, while Liu has no choice but to win the finale if he’s to bridge a 19-point gap.
Heinrich starting from pole only complicates their already tough tasks further.
Nevertheless, all five drivers’ championships and the teams’ crown will be decided on the final day in Shanghai, where Alex Liang Jiatong drew level on points with Silver-Am leaders Brian Lee and Maxime Oosten by winning his class in Race 1 alongside Melvin Moh. Their Craft-Bamboo Mercedes-AMG finished fifth behind Anthony Liu whose slim overall championship chances evaporated when Heinrich passed Loek Hartog on the penultimate lap.
Further back, Am victory helped Zhou Bihuang and Setiawan Santoso (Climax Racing) tighten their grip on the class title, although the new 19-point lead is not yet enough to confirm them as champions.
Elsewhere, James Yu Kuai’s overall championship chances might be over after he and Cheng Congfu finished sixth. But the FAW Audi Sport Asia Team Phantom driver is now all but confirmed as the continent’s SRO GT Academy winner after moving 43 points clear of his nearest rival. Only a serious misdemeanour can potentially prevent him from claiming the fully funded 24 Hours of Spa prize seat alongside a driver from Europe, America and Australia.
The same pair also trail Liu by three points in the Silver class but have the benefit of starting fourth overall and racing without success time.
At the start, Liu wasted no time making amends for missing pole by running wheel to wheel around the outside of Nandy into turn one, then gaining the inside advantage and the lead at the next corner. Absolute’s Lamborghini looked like a formidable opponent in practice and qualifying, but Liu managed the pace as both Silver drivers broke clear of leading Am, Anthony Liu, who jumped Li Lichao and Cheng at the start.
That proved crucial to Nandy holding second after the stops, despite serving a seven-second penalty for racing solo. But it also gave Chen breathing space to enjoy a comfortable second stint out front. Six seconds separated the leading Silvers at the finish.
Instead, attention firmly centred on the fight for the final overall podium place that Liu’s co-driver Hartog initially inherited. Crucially, though, it was the varying degrees of success time for Beijing’s top three that would play a significant role in Origine’s Porsche jumping two places to fifth after Lu swapped with Heinrich.
Hartog was seven seconds up the road when Heinrich relieved Liang of fourth but was swiftly caught by the charging Porsche that initially struggled to find a way through. Indeed, Phantom’s 911 got the better of their initial duel but ultimately relented when Heinrich struck again on the penultimate lap. The pass also resulted in Anthony Liu dropping out of title contention.
Liang and Moh finished an excellent fifth while Yu and Cheng served 21 seconds of success time en route to completing the top six.
A similar penalty kept Huang and Ghiretti in seventh, and Lu’s podium finish made the impact even bigger. Team KRC’s BMW, shared by Ruan Cunfan and debutant Tim Tramnitz, took eighth, while Brendon Leitch pulled off one of the race’s best passes to unseat Climax’s Mercedes-AMG for ninth.
GT World Asia’s championship fights will all be decided during this year’s 12th and final 60-minute race, which begins at 13:05 CST (GT +8) tomorrow.
Image courtesy of GT World Challenge Asia
