2018 China GT Shanghai R8 Race Report

Xu Jia and Alessio Picariello snatched sixth GT3 victory of the season. Xtreme Motorsports turned their luck around and took a strong 1-2 finish for GTC, as did Dong Liang who finally climbed aboard the top of the GT4 rostrum after a wretched weekend.

GT3 Class

Team JRM took the path less travelled and started with pro driver Chris van der Drift. Without surprise, he quickly passed pole-sitter Xu Jia to take the lead, lapping over a second quicker than the Shanghai-born driver and disappeared into the distance.

Eric Zang in the #63 KINGS AMG also jumped teammate Xu at the start, but the more experienced Audi driver reclaimed his position out of the hairpin of T6 shortly afterwards. Xu returned to the pit for driver change 14 seconds behind the leading Porsche. It was time for Belgian star Alessio Picariello to begin the chase.

Picariello pushed hard straight out of the pit, setting fastest lap to fend off an aggressive attack from the AMG of Jan Seyffarth. Despite being locked in an intense fight, the duo both lapped in the 2:05s and were generally 3 or 4 seconds quicker than the #911 gentlemen driver ahead.

Picariello passed Li Chao on lap 18 at T6 for the lead, and Seyffarth quickly followed suit two corners later. In the end, Picariello just managed to take the chequered flag less than a second ahead of the the German campaigner.

D2’s Kuo Kuo Hsin finished off the podium ahead of the two R+ Racing cars of Li Jiaqi and Pan Chao, and Rick Meng.


GTC Class

Experienced campaigner CJ Huang fended off attacks from behind and held the lead. Championship rivals Song Bo made a good start, and vaulted to second from the back of the grid. However, he was later overtaken by teammate Liu Kai and had to settle for third.

Liu Kai in the #68 Xtreme Motorsports Radical had had a troublesome weekend, having failed to make qualifying and retired from the race due to technical gremlins. However, he looked to be on top form on Sunday afternoon and was blisteringly quick. Despite a minor scare, which saw smoke coming out of the Radical’s left rear resulted from a scrap with the #777 GT3, Liu made up seven places on the grid before squeezing past CJ Huang for the lead.

CJ Huang benefited from a shorter pit stop time and emerged out of the pit in P1, but his tyre performance dropped significantly in the second stint, causing him to lap 3 seconds slower. While Huang was struggling for grip, Liu’s co-driver Thomas Ashton was setting fastest laps and quickly overhauled the hobbled Lamborghini. Song Bo’s teammate Dominic Ang also passed Huang on the back straight, and finished second behind Ashton.

The drama lasted till the very last lap when Huang spun on the final corner just before taking the chequered flag. Luckily he managed to restart the car and still made the podium before the Eagle Eye Racing team’s Jason Zhang/Jeffrey Lee, and Daniel Lu/Lawrence Liu could take his spot.

Completing the points-paying position were Paul Wong of KINGS Racing, Ben Rouget and Simon Chan of Eagle Team Racing, Shang Lei and Zheng Hui of R+ Racing, and Wang Tao and Wu Pei of R+ Racing.


GT4 Class

It took two extra formation laps for the race to get going but that’s when things turn pear-shaped.

Xtreme Motorsports’ Lo Sze Ho stormed ahead and cut in front of pole-man Ivan Lee around T1 to take the lead; Ryan Liu also gained three places around the outside and came hot on the heels of Lee’s Fist Team AAI BMW.

Both were head to tail coming out of T4, but a slight nudge by the chasing Aston Martin sent Lee’s #91 BMW pirouetting around onto the grass, consigning the latter to the back of the field.

The drama didn’t end there. Kenny Chung's #55 Ginetta lost its rear going into the left-hander of T10 and crashed heavily into the barrier.

After 4 laps of Safety Car, the race resumed. However, despite being quickest in the first half, Lo ran out of time to build the a gap against the chasing pack before the pit stop.

Behind Lo, Liu had to fend off Dong Liang in his #540 orange McLaren, but the China Equity AMR longer pit stop time inevitably put the #618 back down to fourth after the stop.

Thomas Ashton took the wheel of the #86 KTM, but low tyre pressure has compromised his pace and he was passed by Kevin Chen’s #91 BMW and Jack Mitchell’s #618 Aston Martin.

Mitchell was the ultimate pace-setter of the race, braking late into the hairpin of T6 and nipped past Chen on the inside. However he encountered technical issues, forcing him to gave the position back to Lee and Ashton.

Dong Liang crossed the finished line 4s ahead of Ivan Lee, followed by Thomas Ashton. Jack Mitchell managed to rejoin the race and brought home 12 points. Anthony Chan and Dominic Ang’s #28 Lotus saw off China Equity AMR’s David Pun and Bill O’Brien.

It was really a nightmare of a weekend for the #570 Winning Team entry. After being hit on Saturday, it suffered another mechanical issue today. It lost quite some time going through repairs in the pit and eventually finished the race in seventh.

#11 of Team Lotus encountered mechanical issues and retired after 19 laps. #55 K2C Motorsports entry also recorded a DNF after the first lap crash.

#618 was given a post race drive-through penalty, which was converted to a 23-second time penalty for causing the incident with #91. Finishing positions remained the same.