PICCA Round 10 - Shanghai, China

PICCA Round 10 - Shanghai, China
(Chinese F1 GP - 15-16th October 2005)

Drinking again...

There's something really rather pleasant about drinking champagne on a Sunday morning. After a short work out in a Carrera Cup car - and before an F1 Grand Prix - it's extra special. Continuing our return to form, after the third place in Korea, we finished second in Shanghai.

Having won the Carrera Cup GB title Stuart Parker agreed to come out to China to engineer the A-Ha Racing car. It was good to work with Stuart who I have known since he started his racing team in the late 1990s.

Matthew and Stuart after qualifying.

We were third quickest in the first free practice behind Jonathan Cocker and Darryl O'Young. Jonathan's pace - half a second ahead of Darryl and 0.8 up on me - was already rather worrying. He topped the second session, but now 0.8 up on Darryl who was again second quickest. Noble Group's Simon Harrison was third ahead of Michelin's Jerome Haslin and the Scandanavian Carrera Cup front-runner Nick Karlsson. We were sixth quickest having undertaken a race-distance - with encouraging results.

Qualifying was a disappointment: P5. Cocker was on pole by 6/10ths of a second from Karlsson, then Darryl and Nattavude who suddenly found some speed after, as usual, cruising in free practice.

Before the race Stuart and I felt confident that a good drive could net a podium finish - third certainly and perhaps second with a little luck. It seemed impossible to catch Johnny Cocker who has been comfortably quickest all weekend.

I made a good start and took Nattavude for fourth place on the run to turn one. As we wound our way around the first lap Darryl was challenging Karlsson and slipped nicely up the inside as we entered the long turn 13 which leads onto the 1.2km back straight. But the car got away from him and he spun, being collected by the unlucky Swede. I squeezed up the inside and made good my escape. At the end of the first lap Johnny led by almost two seconds and I had over four on Jerome in the Michelin car.

Essentially the race was over. There was nothing I could do to stop Cocker disappearing into the distance and with a comfortable lead on Haslin I enjoyed 13 laps of the Shanghai circuit without interference.