It was a perfect debut in the International GT Open for ZRS Motorsport. The black Porsche of the Italian squad, driven by Alex Fontana and Pietro Armanni, dominated the Saturday proceedings at the Algarve, taking pole in the morning and an authoritative win in Race 1 in the afternoon, under a warm sun.
“It’s great to start my GT3 career with a win and to have ZRS winning from scratch”, said after the race Armanni, who knows well the squad since his GT Cup Europe days, while Alex Fontana explained: “We did a great job through the sessions and everything went well, except losing the lead at the start to the AF Ferrari, which later had some issue.”
The ZRS Porsche beat the Motopark Mercedes of Maxi Götz-Christian Mansell, the latter resisting and winning a beautiful final duel against Dean Macdonald, second together with Zak Meakin in the Greystone GT McLaren.
The win in Pro-Am was for another Porsche and debuting team, the 911 of Fach Auto Tech of Alexander Fach-Alexander Schwarzer ahead of the CBRX by SPS Mercedes of Dexter Müller-Yannick Mettler and the Saintéloc Racing Audi of Michaël Blanchemain-Jim Pla.
In Am, the laurels were for the Lewandowski family, Andrzej and Adrian, in the Baron Motorsport Ferrari, ahead of the Fach Race Tech Porsche of Joel Monegro and the AF CorseFerrari of Marcelo Hahn-Galid Osman.
THE RACE - Alex Fontana gave pole position to ZRS Motorsport in its debut in the series, repeating the pole conquered here ahead of Race 2 last year. At the start, the Swiss resisted the pressure of Mosca, who shared the first row, but the AF Corse took the lead on lap 2. The duo preceded Basz, Meakin, Götz, local hero Chaves, Pla, Engelhart, and a surprising Mazur, poleman and first leader in Am in the Sendom Lambo.
Drama hit Mosca in lap 3, as the Italian suffered a puncture and dropped to the very back after the forced pit stop. Bad news is not over for the Italian as in lap 8, he gets in contact with Hernández as he tries to pass him, with the Mercedes going into the gravel and getting trapped, which prompts the safety car out.
At the restart, on lap 11, Fontana manages to pull away a bit, building a 3-second advantage on a group in full fight comprising Basz, Götz, Pla and Lebbon, then Chaves (warned because of track limits), Engelhart, and the Polish duo leading in Am formed by Mazur and Lewandowski.
The pit stops start on lap 16, with more bad luck for AF Corse, as Abril gets stopped in the pit lane after leaving its position. After all changes, Armanni leads with 3 seconds over Mansell and Macdonald in a full fight, Emson, Blanchemain (first in Pro-Am), Neubauer, Mettler (who will get a 5-second penalty for not serving the entire handicap), Fach, Jedlinski and Bateman. Adrian Lewandowski is first in Am ahead Monegro and Wira.
In the last part of the race, with Armanni safely holding the lead, all the attention is on the beautiful duel between Mansell and Macdonald which will see the Australian holding the fort up to the flag, and on the battle for 11th between Jefferies, Bateman, Salaquarda and J.Kell, who will finish in that order after exchanging positions several times. Post-race, Jefferies will receive a 5-second penalty and drop 4 positions because of a race incident.
