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Hohenthal Fights Back With Fourth Win Of The Season |
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Monday, 14 August 2006 |
Sebastian Hohenthal (Northampton) evened the score with his Formula Renault UK with Michelin Championship rival Patrick Hogan (Killiney, Co Dublin) by winning round 14 of the Championship at Snetterton on Sunday, 13th August. The Swede scores two bonus points for setting the Fastest Lap with a time of 1min 06.411s (105.81mph) and is now just two points behind Hogan, who finished second, in the drivers’ standings. Hohenthal’s Fortec Motorsport team-mate James Sutton (New Barnet, Herts) finished third.
A third Fortec driver, Sam Bird (Claygate, Surrey), completed a great weekend in which he had to drive a brand new car after a big accident at Donington Park in the last round with fourth place, while the other member of the team, Fabio Onidi (Northampton) took over the lead of the B4 Group Graduate Cup with a 10th place finish as former Graduate Cup leader Dean Smith (Wolverhampton) could only manage 15th.
As in the day’s first race, Hohenthal made a tremendous start and passed Cheng Cong Fu (Oxford) before the first corner, Riches. He then carried his greater speed through Sear corner and onto the Revett Straight, where he passed AKA Lemac’s Hogan on the entry to the Esses.
Manor Motorsport’s Franck Mailleux (Hull) made a great start, picking up three places from ninth on the grid on his way to a season’s best fifth place. Mark Burdett Motorsport’s Markus Niemelä (Lincoln) also got away well, passing seven cars to climb from 17th to ninth after just three laps of action.
Just as the front three were opening a gap to fourth placed Sutton,
Cheng’s engine blew in spectacular fashion to end his race just as he
was attempting to pass Hogan, promoting Sutton to the final podium
spot. Meanwhile, Mailleux and Bird found way past the less experienced
Graduate Cup driver Daniel Roos (Bishop’s Stortford).
With drivers desperate to make up places in the early stages, Mailleux
attempted to pass Sutton for fourth place but when he failed to make
the move stick, Bird took advantage to claim fourth place. Just behind,
AKA Lemac’s Jeremy Metcalfe (Fleet, Hants) passed Roos to move into the
top six.
Once Bird had got pounced on Mailleux’ mistake, he set about passing
his team-mate, Sutton. Although Bird almost made it through on the
entry to the Esses, Sutton covered the racing line well to protect
third place. Bird, with very limited time in his new car, continued to
swarm all over the gearbox of his team-mate but was forced to settle
for fourth place.
The gap between Hohenthal and Hogan was static at around half a second
for the first half of the race before the Swede put in the Fastest Lap
of the race to move to one second ahead. His Irish rival hit back over
the course of the next few laps, however, to reduce the deficit to a
few tenths of a second.
Further down the field, Dean Smith was coming under pressure from
Scorpio Motorsport’s Will Bratt, while Onidi was fighting to pass
Niemelä but neither driver was able to make a successful overtaking
move. Meanwhile, Sutton and Bird began to edge away from the tussle for
fifth place with very consistent lap times.
On the 18th and final lap, Metcalfe made one last attempt to snatch
fifth place from Mailleux. The 18-year-old did manage to get past at
Riches, only to run wide on the exit and be overtaken by Mailleux and
the opportunistic Roos, who scored a season’s best result of sixth.
Hohenthal continued to lead the way at the front and won from Hogan by
1.023s. Commenting on a faultless performance that gave him a crucial
victory, Hohenthal said: “My starts are getting better and better and
once I was ahead I tried to push for four laps to open a gap. I saw
Paddy was still right behind me so I pushed harder for another few laps
and the car was good enough to keep on pushing. It was like Donington,
where a small mistake could be a big difference but I kept my cool and
it’s great to win.”
Hogan remained philosophical after finishing second, saying: “I’m
disappointed not to win and a bad start has cost me here. I had good
pace throughout and stayed on his gearbox to keep him honest the whole
race. There was nothing I could do to get past but I have to be happy
with the way the weekend’s gone because I was quickest in most of the
sessions and I’m still leading the Championship.”
Sutton, who returned to the podium for the first time since round seven
at Knockhill, added: “This is long overdue for me. Sam was so close
behind me that when I looked and saw I was in P3 with 11 laps to go, I
didn’t think I could stay in front for that long. But I managed to get
my head down and find a good rhythm and hold him off until the end.”
Rounds 15 and 16 form part of the World Series by Renault meeting at Donington Park Grand Prix circuit on 9th/10th September.
Championship standings after Round 14 - provisional
| Pos. |
Driver |
Nationality |
Team |
Points |
| Drivers’ Championship standings |
| 1 |
Patrick Hogan |
IRL |
AKA Lemac |
348 |
| 2 |
Sebastian Hohenthal |
SWE |
Fortec Motorsport |
346 |
| 3 |
Cheng Cong Fu |
CHN |
Manor Motorsport |
254 |
| 4 |
James Sutton |
GBR |
Fortec Motorsport |
253 |
| 5 |
Jeremy Metcalfe |
GBR |
AKA Lemac |
242 |
| 6 |
Sam Bird |
GBR |
Fortec Motorsport |
227 |
| 7 |
Will Bratt |
GBR |
Scorpio Motorsport |
199 |
| 8 |
Markus Niemelä |
FIN |
Mark Burdett Motorsport |
178 |
| 9 |
Valle Makela |
FIN |
Manor Motorsport |
161 |
| 10 |
Richard Keen |
GBR |
Position 1 Racing |
160 |
| B4 Group Graduate Cup Standings |
| 1 |
Fabio Onidi |
ITA |
Fortec Motorsport |
135 |
| 2 |
Dean Smith |
GBR |
Coles Racing |
132 |
| 3 |
Daniel Roos |
SWE |
Nexa Racing |
115 |
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 06 January 2007 )
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