- Cecotto and Postiglione finish in second place but are still leading the PRO standings
- Raffaele Giannoni takes a double pole position and a victory in the AM
- Juan Perez scores his fourth win in a row in the Lamborghini Cup category
Sant’Agata Bolognese/Nürburg, September 16, 2017.
At the Nürburgring, Loris Spinelli and Mikaël Grenier have obtained their poker of victories in the Lamborghini Super Trofeo Europe. The line-up of the team Antonelli Motorsport won the first of the two races of the penultimate round of the season, after the Italian driver left everyone behind during qualifying. This success was built from the early laps, when Spinelli took the lead and kept his position even after the initial intervention of the safety car (necessary to remove Hendrik Still’s car that had stopped in a dangerous position), before handing over the wheel to his teammate during the pit stop. Then Grenier did the rest and managed to keep an unbridled Vito Postiglione behind, during the last laps. This latter driver had taken over the wheel from Jonathan Cecotto on the car of Imperiale Racing.
Thanks to this second place, Postiglione and Cecotto managed to keep their leadership in the PRO category, in which the top four crews are gathered in very few points. Spinelli and Grenier, instead, moved up to the second position in the standings, with a “gap” of only 6 points from the top. Two points behind them are Rik Breukers and Axcil Jefferies (GDL Racing), who finished sixth overall after getting a 10-second penalty that deprived them from the lowest step of the podium, because of a contact between Jefferies and Raphael Abbate at the last corner. The Brazilian driver, who had taken over the wheel from Yuki Nemoto was third at that moment but spun off and eventually finished fifth. This result allowed the duo of VS Racing to remain in contention for the title.
The third place was conquered by Jan Kisiel and Morgan Haber, who were the fastest during the first part of this weekend, with one of the cars of Leipert Motorsport. Liang Jiatong and Christopher Dreyspring finished fourth overall and first in the PRO-AM. The drivers of VS Racing managed to further increase the advantage in their category. Immediately behind them is Kikko Galbiati, who took the pole with another Lamborghini Huracán Super Trofeo of Antonelli Motorsport and the lead during his "stint", then he handed over the wheel to Gianluca Giraudi who lost a position during the closing laps. Shota Abkhazava and Kelvin Snoeks (Artline Team Georgia) concluded in third position.
In the AM class, Raffaele Giannoni (Automobile Tricolore) made himself a special gift on his birthday: he was the fastest driver during both qualifying sessions and conquered his third success of the season with authority, thus holding open the fight for the championship, which sees the Poles Lewandowski and Teodor Myszkowski (VS Racing) leading the standings but in today’s race they finished second ahead of Miro Konopka (ARC Bratislava).
In the Lamborghini Cup, the Colombian Juan Perez scored his fourth consecutive success with another car of Antonelli Motorsport and earned further points against the leader of the standings, Gerard Van der Horst, as well as William Van Deyzen, who finished third and second respectively.
Race 2 will kick off tomorrow at 1:40 p.m. CEST and will last fifty minutes with a rolling start and mandatory pit-stop.
Live streaming on: http://squadracorse.lamborghini.com/live-streaming.
DRIVERS’ QUOTES
Loris Spinelli/Antonelli Motorsport (1st overall and in the PRO): "I kept a good pace since the start and then my co-driver, Grenier, managed to keep the leading position till the end. With this victory, we earned important points for the title, also thanks to a car that has been perfect since yesterday’s free practice".
Christopher Dreyspring/VS Racing (1st in the PRO-AM): "My co-driver did a good job during the first stint and in the second part of the race I managed to take the lead in the PRO-AM: it was a good result on a circuit which I wasn’t familiar with".
Raffaele Giannoni/Automobile Tricolore (1st in the AM): "This race went smoothly at last!". I started from the pole position then I took the lead and was very careful during the pit-stops, in the end I managed to score this win exactly on my birthday! According to maths, the last word has not been spoken".
Juan Perez/Antonelli Motorsport (1st in the Lamborghini Cup): "The team did an excellent job. This is my first time at the Nürburgring, as it was at Paul Ricard and Spa. Four victories in a row are an amazing result".