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Good races - the boys were able to stretch their legs, unlike Estoril and Eastern Creek.
Alex had quite a good time in the feature but really bombed into the pits, locked up and had a bit of a scare (any info, Doc?). He then span before recovering to fifth.
Great sprint race with passing at the front between France, Switzerland and GB. Same in the feature but the GB package is not as good as the other two. Again, Jos and Piquet stalled on the grid.
Will Davidson wasn't too special. Enge did well.
Comments
Alex wasn't too put off by his slide off. If you're on the edge, that can happen and he recovered the position with a great overtaking of the higher placed New Zeland car.
His start was impressive, picking up 2 placesand evading a slow car in front. He could teach Schumacher a new swerve.
There were quite a few really good head to head battles, Fr vs GB, Fr vs Sw, Mal vs NZ. A few offs, but the circuit proved safe and challenging and the Safety Car didn't have to come out despite a few yellow flags.
Alex was fairly pleased, but a bit frustrated that his Q7 was lost to 8th place during Fairus' effort in the Sprint Race. Still that's home circuit racing where both boys wanted to perform in front of their fans, and Fairus still picked up a handy 3 points, which together with Alex's six points for 5th place in the Feature event gave Malaysia 4th highest in the points for the day.
Malaysia is now in 6th place in the Series.
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But really, he seemed kind of out of his depth in GP2. Good guy though?
Great result for Alex, send him our regards and congratulations. :)
Ihe Malaysian race worked out OK, with Alex having the benefit of starting the main event fresh and the team having 3 points safe from the Sprint. Fairus made quite a determined startin the Sprint but didn't manage to get through too well. He showed speed but lost a place overall when the team badly needed to move up the order, if they were ever to have a chance at the podium.
I think that as the pressure builds, the team will have to consider their best prospect for the weekend results. Alex's additional experience gives him the edge to score those essential overtaking moves. Especially on new unfamilair circuits, every driver needs maximum laps to check the driving line oiptions, perfect the set-up and build the fel of the circuit. Giving up half that opportunity by sharing driving duty just isn't on. Alternate race weekends is one option but will be a death knell for the driver who doesn't score well.
You have to get your race experience and build your career in a series where you can dominate and be the one overtaking. That's what Alex is doing now. Maybe Fairus isn't quite ready yet and should keep his involvement going in the F3 series. He's a good back-up for Alex and has speed and promise.
Spoke to Greg Wheeler, the team's chief engineer (ex Minardi), and other technical guys. They're all enjoying the series and the challenge and seem quite a motivated crew.
Thanks to the whole team for a great race, and thanks to Jack and Owen for the opportunity to visit the pit.
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The a1 series provide two cars per country so each team has a spare.
With twenty five teams, and 25 cars on the circuit, there is a good field. I think fifty cars would be too many, with the fast drivers getting held up too often.
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