The Gulf Radical Cup was back to the Yas Marina Circuit for Round 5.
Unfortunately the proposed Round 7 in Qatar has had to be cancelled, so extra races were added to Round 5 and Round 6 (later on in Dubai) to make up for the lost round. So this means two very busy weekends of racing, with an extra Enduro Race at Yas and two extra Sprint races at the Dubai Autodrome two weeks later.
As the cars rolled out for Sprint qualifying it was indeed series leader George King putting in a new lap record time of 1:56.890, a full 0.6 seconds ahead of Alex Bukantsoz in second, with Ian Loggie in third.
GRC regular Ian Roberts was teaming with with long time UAE racer and driver coach, Ramez Azzam. Ramez hasn’t raced for a few years, but is a regular on test days, so will be a force to be reckoned with.
Azzam wasted no time showing his intent, taking the lead in Sprint Race 1 from King, and basically holding it for the next 25 minutes. While King was on equal terms, he didn’t quite have enough to be close enough to make a pass. As the race went on King appeared to back off a little to save his tyres for race 2, maybe!
In the end to was Azzam from King, and then Loggie. But after a post race penalty for King and Bukhantsov for gaining an advantage off track at the start of the race, it promoted Loggie to second and demoted King to 3rd.
In Sprint Race 2 Alex Bukhantsov had pole position, and with that he made an excellent start to roll out of turn one in the lead. This left rivals Loggie and King nose to tail thought the race, with King defending his second place position from Loggie in third.
The next morning would see two 45 minute enduro races. One as part of Round 5 and one as part of Round 6.
In Enduro Qualifying 1 it was Loggie taking pole from Azzam and then King in third.
However, with an engine issue for Bukanstsov he would not start Enduro two, it would have been a tricky race for him anyway, as he was carrying 15 seconds extra in the pits from this last Enduro Race win in Dubai. This left the race wide open to Loggie, King and James Sweetnam who had been fighting all weekend long.
But it was Azzam who again got a great start and headed into the lead, closely followed by King, Loggie and Sweetnam. As the pit stops came around it was Azzam handing the lead to his team mate Roberts, but he instantly had Loggie all over him, with King and Sweetnam right behind.
Loggie was able to pass Roberts for the lead, in the mean time (and with no pit stop penalty) Jacopo Mazza had worked his way up the field, but unbeknown to him, he was carrying a 7 second post race penalty for speeding in the pit lane.
As King and Sweetnam diced with Roberts there was contact braking into turn 6, resulting in damage on both cars, taking them out the race.
This left Mazza in second, with Sweetnam in third, and Usmaan Mughal having moved nicely up to fourth after taking over from his team make Zaair Moorad. But with three laps to go, the seven second penalty being carried Mazza would drop him to 4th, promote Sweetnam to 2nd and give Team Pakistan their first Enduro Podium.
Tensions were running high as the race came to a close, but with Sweetnam and Mughal now nose to tail their pace slowed just enough for Mazza to keep 7.3 seconds between him and Mughal. This meat that Sweetnam was promoted to second, and Mazza demoted to third, and no podium for Team Pakistan. But a great drive to get to 4th non the less! Loggie was away in the lead for a great win!
A few hours later was the start of Enduro Race 2. Bukhantsov was back out having been lent the spare engine of Ian Loggie (showing great sportsmanship).
As the cars roared into turn one, Roberts and Mughal came into contact (later to be classified as a racing incident as per the stewards), with Roberts spinning out, while the very unlucky Marcus Bamberg collected Roberts heavily, doing significant damage to both cars. Drivers were ok, while theirs cars were stranded in the middle of the track..
This brought the safety car out while the cars and debris was cleared away. The cars were lead through the pitlane and down into the pit tunnel due to the blocked track at turn 1.
When the cars cleared away, racing was back underway and it was King was back in the lead! Loggie had work to do given his 15 second pitstop penalty, Closely followed by Jacopo Mazza putting pressure on both of them, sadly he would miss out on a podium due to a pitstop infringement that saw him serve a driver through penalty. After the pitstops. Amir Feyzulin was up to second, with Khazzoum in third.
However Loggie was the fastest car on track, and with Bukhantsov appearing to have issues it allowed Loggie to work his way back up to second.
Disaster struck for Feyzulin on the last lap with the car pulling to a stop with a fuel pressure issue, but this meant Khazzoum took third place.
So, that was Round 5 and a but of 6 done. King still holds a decent lead in the series, but with double point at the last race and with Loggie closing him down, this season (as have the past three seasons) will come down to the wire at the last event!
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