26 Sep 2015 Circuit Hero One Race 1: Fiery heroes
At 2:45pm on 19 September 2015, Pan Delta Autumn Race's Circuit Hero One's 31 cars come on to the grid. These highly modified cars will race over a distance of 15 laps. Cars entered include a Mercedes SLS, Ferrari 458, Audi R8, TTS, Subaru, Lotus etc.
Guo Guo-Xin is on pole position in his Mercedes SLS. His challenger, Ferrari 458 driver Sam Lok is in second position. Tommy Chan (Juno) and Jon Flinn (Radical SR1) line up on row 2 in their prototypes.
At the start, the Ferrari gets away well while the Mercedes SLS is slow off the line. Sam Lok leads into the first corner while Guo Guo-Xin is down the order. But his car has a huge speed advantage and in just five corners he is back up in fifth place. When the leaders are back on the main straight, the Mercedes is up to 3rd place already.
But the attention of the crowd soon move to the midfield as two Atom race cars crash on the main straight and one of them catches fire. Fortunately the fire goes out quickly. As soon as the cars stop the drivers get out. The race officials release the safety car and yellow flags to halt the race. The accident happened right in front of the spectators and will surely be a talking point all week long.
On lap 8, the safety car leaves the track and race resumes. The Mercedes SLS takes off and sprints to second place right behind the Ferrari 458. At turn 7, the Mercedes outbrakes the Ferrari on the inside line to take the lead. The spectators cheer its good move.
Lap 10, Liu Peng's Ferrari loses its rear bumper on the main straight. Fortunately nobody is directly behind it. As the part falls on the racing line, the cars coming up have to be careful to avoid hitting it.
Lap 13, the race officials calls a red flag to end the race, as there are now too many dangerous elements on track. Guo Guo-Xin is declared the winner and Sam Lok gets second place, 5 seconds behind. Tommy Chan is third and Zhang Guo-Hao is fourth.
After the race, Guo Guo-Xin said, "My car is a GT machine, it does not have a standing start system. Every time at the start of the race I lose out. But overall it has been a good performance. I have won all five races this year and I hope to complete the set tomorrow in the sixth race. I really welcome the two Ferraris this weekend. Competition improves everybody. I hope that when they have made improvements next year, we can have a proper race battle."
Sam Lok said, "This race has been exciting. Guo Guo-Xin's GT3 machine is clearly faster, it is only fair that I lost to him. For the next race I will try to get as close to him as I can."
Third place finisher, Liu Peng, said,"In the morning I was hit and the car was damaged. The bumpers were stuck on by tape. The brakes were fixed by the technicians at noon. The car was not in good condition. There were many accidents and after the safety car period, I was anxious and passed a few cars. I am satisfied with the race result and next year I plan to upgrade my car to challenge for the top podium position."
Circuit Hero One Race 1 Top 3 class finishers
|
Class |
Position |
No. |
Driver |
|
A |
1 |
177 |
Su Ying-Kang |
|
2 |
7 |
Bill O’Brien |
|
|
3 |
11 |
Robert Webb |
|
|
B |
1 |
8 |
Zhang Guo-Hao |
|
2 |
38 |
Hong Shi-Jie |
|
|
3 |
3 |
Lu Ji-Zu |
|
|
C |
1 |
107 |
Zhang De-Xiang |
|
2 |
49 |
Phang Thang Kim |
|
|
3 |
26 |
Field Lee John |
|
|
F |
1 |
23 |
Lin Rong |
|
2 |
21 |
Liang Yong-Chao |
|
|
3 |
22 |
Liu Zhao |
|
|
Open A |
1 |
66 |
Tommy Chan |
|
2 |
12 |
Jon Flinn |
|
|
3 |
- |
- |
|
|
Open B |
1 |
31 |
Guo Guo-Xin |
|
2 |
63 |
Sam Lok |
|
|
3 |
77 |
Liu Peng |