Audi South Africa Press Release
The Zwartkops Raceway results from Saturday show three Audi S4 quattros in the top four overall results of the day. Each of the two race wins also featured an Audi S4 quattro on the top step of the podium.
The first race victory of the day went to the defending champion, Michael Stephen (A1 – Engen Xtreme) who started on a strong footing, posting the fastest qualifying time in a hotly contested session.
“We've done a lot of hard work for the Zwartkops event and it has paid off,” says Stephen. “Pole position and winning the first race is a good result. With Zwartkops such a tough track to find an opportunity to overtake, I'm very happy with the second-place finish in race two from a fifth-place start.”
Race two saw Hennie Groenewald (A8 – Audi Sasolracing) the man to claim the chequered flag, not only winning the feature race and claiming double points in the process, but also showing a welcome return to form and putting some disappointing race days in his rearview mirror.
“I've had a win at Zwartkops before,” says Groenewald. “This was a feature race win though, so that's my best result to date. Race one was a good race, but a 30 second penalty for overtaking under a yellow flag eradicated that result for me, even though Gennaro had a problem with his car and moved over to let me past.”
Gennaro Bonafede (A32 – Audi Sasolracing) suffered some damage in the first race which jammed his air intake and he lost power. Race two saw him racing hard and he took the third step on the podium – to claim third overall for the race day.
“We raced hard this weekend,” says Bonafede. “We had a bit of bad luck, but we're looking forward to Cape Town. We will again be quite evenly matched with our competition and it should be really good racing for the penultimate round of the season.”
For racer Simon Moss (A38 – Engen Xtreme) the pace of qualifying which put his times so close to his teammate didn't quite manage to deliver the race results he was aiming for – despite his confidence behind the wheel.
“Qualifying times were very close to Michael, so I was very happy with that,” says Moss. “In the first race I had engine trouble and wasn't able to finish. In race two, I got boxed in on the start and that impacted on my track position. I challenged a bit but went off during the second race, but recovered and got within the same laptimes as the leaders.”
“I'm looking forward to the Cape Town event, I think that is going to be very challenging and also very exciting event to tackle next.”
The Audi S4 quattro racers head to Killarney for the second-last round of their 2014 championship on Saturday, 27 September.
Photo credit: motorpress.co.za
