14 Dec 2011 2011 AFR Series finished successfully, Two champions in two categories
The final race of the 2011 AFR Series was held successfully last weekend. After 12 rounds in different cities around China, the overall driver championship in the International category was won by Leopold Ringbom from PS Racing; Champ’s Yuki Shiraishi was runner-up and PS Racing’s Alexandra Asmasoebrata stood in 3rd place on the championship podium. Yuki Shiraishi was also the title winner in the Asian category, while Alexandra was runner-up and Kazuhiro Saeki from Champ Motorsport took 2nd runner-up. For the team title, PS Racing won the International category and Champ was the title winner in the Asian category.
Qualifying-- Leopold Ringbom Took Pole
Qualifying for AFR Round 11 took place at 11:50pm on December 10th. Leopold Ringbom went out ten minutes into the session and set what was initially the fastest time - however, five minutes later Yuki Shiraishi bested Leopold’s time to reset a new pole position lap. But just when it seemed that Yuki had pole position, with only a few minutes left Leopold changed to a second set of new slick tires to better his time and managed to retake pole from Yuki by a scant 0.15 seconds, just before the end of the session. Taking 3rd place on grid was Alexandra Asmoebrata.
Round 11-- Yuki Shiraishi Won Round 11 to Finish 2nd in AFR Series; Leopold took 2nd to become 2011 AFR Series Champion
Round 11, the first race of the weekend, took place on December 10th. After a full course yellow and safety car deployment after the first lap due to the collision between FRD Motorsport’s Diana Rosario and Timothy Teo of Asia Racing Team at T7, the race was restarted with Leopold holding onto the lead. However, at the beginning of the second lap after the restart, Shiraishi made an aggressive pass on Leopold into T1 to become the new race leader, with the order until the checkered flag Shiraishi, Leopold, and Alexandra, who managed to impress in the race by fending off Kazuhiro Saeki and Shigetomo Shimono.
Round 12-- Champ’s Yuki Shiraishi Took Double Win for Weekend; PS Racing’s Leopold Ringbom 2nd and Champ’s Kazuhiro Saeki 3rd.
Race 12 was held on Dec 11th at 12:30pm. Leopold got off to one of his trademark fast starts, but Shiraishi was able to squeeze by him going into turn one to get in front and lead the race from start to finish. 3rd place was gained by Kazuhiro from Champ Motorsport. Although Alexandra finally pulled off a brilliant pass on Shigetomo to finish in 4th place, unfortunately she and Leopold received 10 second post-race penalties for a technical issue which moved her to 5th place - however Leopold’s finish of 2nd was not affected due to a strong 16 second gap he built up on 3rd place Kazuhiro over the course of the race.
Leopold Ringbom: Driver Champion in International Category
“I am very happy that I can take home the championship trophy one race ahead of the last race. I will not forget all the things that happened during this year as a member of PS Racing, and really want to give great thanks to the team - without their professionalism; I would not have been able to win. Also, I learned a lot during this season. At this moment I do not know whether I will be back or not for next year, but one thing I can be sure about is that I enjoyed being a driver and winner in the AFR Series.”