Sunday, June 16: Team Abu Dhabi’s Thani Al-Qamzi held off a determined challenge from the CTIC China Team’s Peter Morin to earn a narrow 1.439-second victory in the second of the Sprint races at the Regione Sardegna Grand Prix of Italy in Olbia on Sunday morning.
Al-Qamzi said: “My start wasn’t the best but I kept my position and then I drive easy. I didn’t push. I see the second place (Morin) was far away. The Grand Prix will not be easy. All the drivers are racing well. I feel the boat is very nice on this course.”
Morin added: “The race was amazing. We improved some things on the boat and it works. This afternoon I will start from third position and we will see what happens. Thani will be in front of me again with a rolling start so we will see what are the options. I had a very good start and saw him in my mirror. He was very close and I left him some space. We have another race today so I didn’t take any risks.”
Al-Qamzi’s team-mate Alberto Comparato looked set to secure the final place on the podium until he suffered handling issues with his DAC near the finish and gifted third place to the Red Devil-SMC F1 Team’s Ferdinand Zandbergen.
The second of the 15-lap Sprint races saw Al-Qamzi line up on pole position from Morin and the flying Dutchman Zandbergen. Morin’s team-mate Brent Dillard had damaged his engine in a crash during Saturday morning’s qualifying session and was not able to take the start in fifth. That moved Comparato up a place ahead of Bartek Marszalek, the Victory Team’s Ahmad Al-Fahim, Filip Roms and Alexandre Bourgeot.
In a carbon copy of the start from Sprint race one, Morin, like Andersson, made the best start but Al-Qamzi closed the door and maintained his advantage. Comparato moved ahead of Zandbergen to snatch third but a flying Al-Fahim got out of phase and almost barrel-rolled his Victory Team hull. The Emirati recovered but slipped back to eighth place.
Al-Qamzi edged 4.079sec ahead of Morin through five laps, as Al-Fahim tried to redeem himself by passing Bourgeot at the rear of the field. By halfway, Al-Qamzi’s advantage had been trimmed to 1.926sec but the Emirati stayed ahead of the Frenchman with his Team Abu Dhabi team-mate Comparato defending third place.
There were no dramas for the Emirati veteran over the closing laps and the Team Abu Dhabi driver guided his new DAC to the win and 10 championship points. Morin came home in second and Zandbergen secured third after Comparato suffered late handling issues. Marszalek, Roms, Bourgeot and Al-Fahim rounded off the finishers.
