A Valuable Three Points at Nogaro
5th October 2008
A hard fought sixth place was the final result for the Scuderia Ecosse team
at Nogaro today. After a tough qualifying session on Saturday, when the team
tested new compounds that Pirelli had brought with them to try out at Nogaro,
the team started in 7th place on the grid.
The opening laps of Fabio Babini’s stint saw the coming together of
car ‘62’ and the G2 Aston Martin, as it attempted an over aggressive
move in its inaugural outing, costing the team over 10 seconds at a critical
stage of the race. This incident forced an early pit stop and driver change
before the team had the time to settle into a steady rhythm in the opening
stages. Jamie Davies drove consistently before handing back over to Fabio to
continue a closely fought battle with the rest of the GT2 field for the chequered
flag.
The recent 2008 updates to the Scuderia Ecosse car helped achieve top spot
during this morning’s warm up session and delivered an encouraging pace
throughout the two-hour race. Coupled with two slick pit stops, 6th place was
secured and another valuable 3 points were added to the team’s championship
total, ahead of the penultimate round at Zolder in two weeks time.
After the race Jamie said, “Generally it has been a good weekend and
the race pace we achieved has been encouraging. Once again the tyres proved
to be consistent and I feel Pirelli are moving in the right direction with
their development programme”.
Post race Fabio added, "After being hit by the G2 Aston Martin my race
and my strategy were both compromised but I was able to push throughout my
stints. The car ran very well with excellent balance and gave me the confidence
to overtake. The new engine was strong and as ever the team worked hard throughout
the weekend."
As the chequered flag dropped Scuderia Ecosse team principal Stewart Roden
said, ”Having to pit early cost us dearly due to the G2 Aston Martin
making a rash move during the opening laps. The knock on effect from this was
that it set us back for the rest of the race, however on the positive side
the drop-off we experienced was small in comparison to our competitors. This
enabled us to run some 1.5 seconds faster than the rest of the pack but because
of the valuable time we had lost in the early stages of today’s race
we were always playing a game of catch up”.
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