Switzerland Claims Feature Race Victory in New Zealand

Taupo, New Zealand - A1 Team Switzerland claimed its second win of the season in this afternoon's Feature race in A1GP Taupo, New Zealand. Neel Jani finished ahead of Ireland's Adam Carroll and Portugal's Filipe Albuquerque with Ireland retaining its position at the top of the A1GP championship standing.

Ireland had a clean getaway from pole position but the Netherlands' Robert Doornbos was slow off the mark from the front row, allowing Portugal to take advantage, and so dropping back to fifth. Albuquerque was right on the gearbox of Ireland as the field headed into turn one, tapping the Irish car and briefly losing momentum allowing a quick-starting Jani to move up from fourth on the grid to second.

Australia's John Martin made an aggressive start to his Feature race, getting Jackeroo ahead of the Netherlands after first dropping behind Switzerland but remaining in fourth. New Zealand's Chris van der Drift had a problematic start having to pit with a puncture after a collision with Lebanon's Daniel Morad. Morad retired in the pit lane, but New Zealand was able to rejoin, albeit a lap down.

By the end of lap one Ireland led from Switzerland, Portugal, Australia, Netherlands, France and Malaysia, Brazil, USA and India.

Ireland began to pull out a small gap at the front, which was 0.874-seconds from Jani by the end of lap four. Carroll continued to record fastest laps while Monaco's Clivio Piccione capitalised on a mistake from India's Narain Karthikeyan to take ninth.

On lap eight the first pit stop window opened and the emerald green far was first in the pit lane. A good stop from the Irish squad saw the Celtic Tiger retain the lead, while another great stop from the Australian squad got Martin out closer to the leader. Switzerland pitted but wasn't able to take the lead, while Portugal stayed out deep into the pit window in an attempt to make up ground. After recording the fastest lap Albuquerque dived into the pit lane, but with Carroll's new tyres working well he rejoined in third place.

On lap 10 Monaco and Brazil were running wheel-to-wheel when the young Brazilian seemingly closed the door causing the pair to touch, with the result being Brazil spinning across the track and Piccione losing his front wing and running off-track.

After the first round of pit stops the order settled and was Ireland from Switzerland, Portugal, Australia, France, Netherlands, Malaysia, India., USA and Great Britain. Ireland now had a comfortable 3.773-second lead over Switzerland.

On his return to A1GP action China's Congfu Cheng had a spin shortly before Great Britain's Dan Clarke spun under braking into turn 11 on his race debut for the British team. The 25-year-old kept the engine running and rejoined in fifteenth.

On lap 22, the second mandatory pit stop window opened with Australia being first in this time around. Ireland and Switzerland both pitted on the same lap with the Irish team getting their man away a fraction quicker than the Swiss. However, after Carroll had pulled away from his pit box and looked to have retained his lead the anti-stall system kicked in and halted his progress. The car then stalled and as Carroll got his machine moving again Switzerland took the opportunity to get ahead and snatched the lead of the race. Switzerland, Ireland, Portugal was now the top three after Albuquerque had another clean stop to retain position. China had a problematic second stop with Cheng leaving the pits with the rear jack still attached, resulting in a drive-through penalty a few laps later.

On lap 29 the order was now Switzerland leading from Ireland., Portugal, Australia, France, Netherlands, Malaysia, India, Italy, USA and South Africa.

Switzerland had a 1.6-second advantage over Ireland and Portugal was continuing to push, with Albuquerque setting the fastest lap of the race, a 1m 14.898s on lap 30.

On lap 37, Clivio Piccione went off at Turn 11 and beached the Monaco car at the gravel resulting in the Safety Car being deployed. As the field closed back up the scene was set for the final exciting laps of the race. Switzerland controlled on the re-start on Lap 41 as the field made its way through Turn 1 incident-free.

USA's Marco Andretti moved ahead of Italy to take ninth before Indonesia's Satrio Hermanto spun at Turn 12, closely followed by Malaysia's Fairuz Fauzy, who lost seventh and a solid-points finish at the same time at the same corner. While the action at Turn 12 was going on, Netherlands' Robert Doornbos took advantage and made a move to pass France's Loïc Duval.

As the chequered flag came out the top three crossed the line only a few seconds apart. An extremely happy Jani took victory for Switzerland, an even more remarkable achievement given that he was rushed into hospital last week with suspected meningitis, and only came back to full fitness today.

Ireland's points haul means it retains the championship lead with 65 points while Switzerland (52) move up to second ahead of Portugal (49).

"What a weekend in the end," said race-winner Neel Jani. "On Monday I still felt really bad, but I just got better every day with the warm weather in New Zealand, and it looks like the clean, fresh air helped me as well, so that is good.

"The first race was already good, a great pit stop put me up to second, but here coming up from fifth to first was nothing we had ever thought of. I had a great start from fifth to second and I was already next to Adam. I settled for second, but then we had a little problem on the first pit stop as I didn't really get off well as I had a problem with the clutch, and then the second pit stop was fantastic, very quick from the guys. I saw Adam next to me and heard his engine revving on the limiter and thought there must be a problem, and I just kept on my side then and was able to take him like that. Then I was just able to control the race.

"It was a great, great weekend and a fantastic car. This was the most points we have scored on a weekend this season and so now it is starting to come good for us, but there are still a lot of points needed to catch up Ireland."

Commenting on the first corner tap from Portugal, Ireland's Adam Carroll commented: "I needed just a little push to get off the line from behind, and Felipe (Albuquerque) gave me that.

"It was all a bit close and quite interesting," he continued. "But everything was going well until the second pit stop. Basically as I left the engine just went. It didn't stall immediately as to begin with it was okay. Actually the anti-stall system came in, then it stalled completely and I had to bump start it and go again. I don't really know what happened. I was actually lucky not to lose more places. It was unfortunate but second place is still good.

"I pushed hard and got some decent times in. Then the guys did a fantastic job in the pits for the first stop and we were able to come out with a good gap, which I was maintaining until the second stop where it all went wrong."

Portugal's Filipe Albuquerque said: "I think the race pace and our speed this weekend was really there, but it was just a question of being in front. It was interesting to see the gaps between us when Adam was leading and I would have liked to be in front to see if I could have gone at the same pace. I need to congratulate Neel for a good start. I could not do much as I was pushing a lot and here you never rest.

"Offline was really dirty, and once I almost disappeared as it was so grippy on the normal track, but if you went off there was no grip. But I think it was just whoever didn't make a mistake would get third place."

Home favourite Chris van der Drift had a disappointing weekend, ending the Feature race in thirteenth: "The first lap was what gave us the problems during the whole race. We had the anti-stall problem at the start which was unfortunate. Then on the first lap, I don't know who it was, but someone ran into the back of me. It was unfortunate as after that you can't really do much when you are a lap down.

"It was just a pity we couldn't have a better result here for team New Zealand."

Feature Race Results

Pos A1 Team       Driver             Laps Time         Gap

1   SWITZERLAND   Neel JANI           50  06:19.574        -
2   IRELAND       Adam CARROLL        50  06:20.621    1.047
3   PORTUGAL      Filipe ALBUQUERQUE  50  06:21.953    2.379
4   AUSTRALIA     John MARTIN         50  06:30.167   10.593
5   NETHERLANDS   Robert DOORNBOS     50  06:33.976   14.402
6   FRANCE        Loic DUVAL          50  06:36.997   17.423
7   INDIA         Narain KARTHIKEYAN  50  06:39.789   20.215
8   ITALY         Edoardo PISCOPO     50  06:42.730   23.156
9   SOUTH AFRICA  Adrian ZAUGG        50  06:42.921   23.347
10  MALAYSIA      Fairuz FAUZY        50  06:46.406   26.832
11  USA*          Marco ANDRETTI      50  07:05.373   45.799
12  GREAT BRITAIN Daniel CLARKE       49  06:32.633   1 Lap
13  NEW ZEALAND   Chris VAN DER DRIFT 49  06:43.944   1 Lap
14  CHINA         Congfu CHENG        49  06:45.245   1 Lap
15  BRAZIL**      Felipe GUIMARAES    49  06:57.238   1 Lap
16  MEXICO        Salvador DURAN      43  58:11.542   7 Laps
17  INDONESIA     Satrio HERMANTO     42  57:36.757   8 Laps
18  MONACO        Clivio PICCIONE     33  46:53.801  17 Laps
19  LEBANON       Daniel MORAD         1  01:45.294  49 Laps

* 25-second penalty applied for crossing the line on the pit lane exit
** 25-second penalty applied for causing an avoidable collision

Fastest lap: A1 Team Portugal set the fastest lap (1m14.898s) of the 
             Feature race with a speed of 159.6 kph on lap 30.
             

             
             
Sprint Race Results - AMENDED

Pos Team          Driver             Laps Time        Gap

1   IRELAND       Adam CARROLL        15  19:40.271       -
2   SWITZERLAND   Neel JANI           15  19:41.759   1.488
3   NETHERLANDS   Robert DOORNBOS     15  19:43.830   3.559
4   FRANCE        Loic DUVAL          15  19:48.865   8.594
5   NEW ZEALAND   Chris VAN DER DRIFT 15  19:51.937  11.666
6   PORTUGAL      Filipe ALBUQUERQUE  15  19:52.936  12.665
7   ITALY         Edoardo PISCOPO     15  19:55.230  14.959
8   MALAYSIA      Fairuz FAUZY        15  19:56.068  15.797
9   INDIA         Narain KARTHIKEYAN  15  20:01.244  20.973
10  SOUTH AFRICA  Adrian ZAUGG        15  20:02.301  22.03
11  USA           Marco ANDRETTI      15  20:10.836  30.565
12  GREAT BRITAIN Daniel CLARKE       15  20:11.276  31.005
13  INDONESIA     Satrio HERMANTO     15  20:12.632  32.361
14  BRAZIL        Felipe GUIMARAES    15  20:13.405  33.134
15  MEXICO        Salvador DURAN      15  20:20.872  40.601
16  MONACO*       Clivio PICCIONE     15  20:29.552  49.281
17  CHINA         Congfu CHENG        11  15:13.744  4 Laps
18  LEBANON       Daniel MORAD         8  11:30.701  7 Laps
19  AUSTRALIA     John MARTIN          5  06:55.050 10 Laps

* 25-second penalty applied for causing an avoidable collision




2008/09 A1GP World Cup of Motorsport points standings          

Pos A1 Team      Points

1   Ireland        65
2   Switzerland    52
3   Portugal       49
4   France         41
5   Netherlands    38
6   New Zealand    35
7   Malaysia       30
8   Australia      30
9   USA            19
10  Great Britain  16
11  South Africa   16
12  Monaco          9
13  Italy           8
14  India           5
15  Brazil          4
16  Korea           4
17  China           4
18  Lebanon         3
19  Indonesia       0
20  Mexico          0

Next race: A1GP Gauteng, South Africa, 20 - 22 February 2009. 

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