12 Dec 2010 Circuit Hero 500 km Endurance Race: Electrics-less Radical bags narrow win

The inaugural Circuit Hero 500 km Endurance Race was in the end was narrowly won by PTRS’s no. 2 Radical. The team completed 91 laps in 3 hours, equivalent to 391 km. Apart from taking overall victory, PTRS also won the open class.

Second overall went to Track Torque’s no. 7 Caterham Super 7. It was only 31.9 seconds behind at the flag. Third was the no.8 Honda Civic driven by Zhou Zhi-Rong, Li Shu-Lian and He Zi-Xian. The trio completed 86 laps. The no. 2 Radical and no. 7 Caterham had a very competitive race, both cars were light weight, low on fuel consumption and simple construction, minimizing their needs to stop in order to maximize their race distance.

Radical drivers Chen Wei-Liang and Zhang Shan-Qi said afterwards that their car’s electrics had failed towards the end, therefore it was only cruising around the circuit. They were being chased very closely by the Caterham, and the team prayed that the car would hold together. Chen Wei-Liang said the race director said they could cross the line in the pit-lane and so that’s what they did because the car would not last another lap. The winning no. 2 Radical also managed the race’s fastest lap: 1:48.552.
 

The no. 7 Caterham still claimed a win in class B. The three drivers William O’Brien, Steve Garner and Nigel Farmer completed 91 laps, just like the winning car. They have also raised a lot of money for Ronald McDonald House of Hong Kong. Class B’s first runner’s up spot went to Tang You-Xi and Huang Chu-Han, the duo completed 80 laps.

Class A was won by the no. 8 Honda Civic driven by Zhou Zhi-Rong, Li Shu-Lian and He Zi-Xian. Their Honda Civic had a steady race and completed 86 laps, 6 laps more than class A 1st runner’s up Sun Zheng, Benny Lin and Xu Guan-Quan. The no. 1 car driven by Zhang Han-Biao, Guo Hai-Sheng and Lin Li-Feng suffered a mechanical problem and pulled off the track at turn 4 on lap 57.
 

Class C only had two entries. No. 16 Ma Jian, Wang Hao and Rui Jun-Bin retired after just 14 laps, allowing the no. 6 Swift, driven by Hu Tie-Biao, Zuo Ming-Wen and Liang Xiao-Ming to take the class title almost unchallenged.
 

Although the winning car did not achieve the 500 km as set out, 7 out of 9 entries managed to finish this special 3 hours endurance race, a high rate for this inaugural race. The competition has been really strong among participating teams and is a big encouragement to the organizers.