Round 4 - Jesolo Results

• QUALIFYING - P8

• HEAT 1 - P4 (—> P8 due to bumper penalty)

• HEAT 2 - P5

• FINAL - P4

After a very strong final Free Practice, with the 3rd fastest time (47.93 secs) I felt pumped and ready to give another strong Qualifying performance in Round 4 of the Italian IAME Series Master Championship.

Unfortunately the qualy lap did not go my way, I left around 2 tenths on the table (mainly on the braking zones) and recorded a lap of 48.12 secs. This was only good enough for 8th place, which made the job ahead in a very competitive field on a tough track very difficult.

For Heat 1 I managed to be 6th by turn 3 and hooked my nose behind Diego Dagostino in 5th who I knew was one of the fastest karts on track. After a few turns though I realized I would not be able to follow him, my kart just didnt have the front end I wanted especially on cold tyres. I battled a bit with Danilo Lucchiesse who was 5th and managed to overtake him around lap 5. After that I run a bit on clean air and had solid pace matching the karts in Front. I finally brought the kart home in 4th place, but to my great suprise my front bumper had slighlty moved in, probably from some soft contact in the opening laps… Immediately I knew that the accompanying 5 second penalty would make me start for Heat 2 from the back again.

Heat 2 starting from 8th place again, I decided to go in the outside on turn 1 and 2 and gained 2 places, bringing me up to 6th place again. After a nice battle for 5th which i won, I then had a lonely race to the finish line as the karts in front had opened a significant gap on the first few laps.

In the Final starting from 7th on the grid, I was 4th for the first 5 laps always close and within 2 seconds behind the leaders. I then had a nice battle with the driver behind me who had a bit more pace in the Final. In the end i brought the kart home at 4th place in the Master category and got some solid points.

However I was not pleased with my pace in the Final, I was missing some performance and consistency, which meant I could not stay close to the leaders and fight for a podium finish which was my target.

As a consolation (yet) another 4th and 5th positions in Round 4 gave me some good points which means that halfway through the season I maintain my 3rd place in the Championship Standings

Looking forward to coming back stronger in the next race!