Craft-Bamboo Racing have laid down the gauntlet during unofficial practice for the opening round of the 2015 GT Asia Series at Korea International Circuit [KIC], the Aston Martin team running 1-2 at various stages during the three one hour sessions, with star recruit Richard Lyons smashing the 2014 lap record during the closing stages of the late afternoon session.
Despite having spent much of the last 15 years in Asia, Lyons was actually a Korea International Circuit ‘rookie’ coming into the morning’s opening session, but by early afternoon he looked every bit the experienced GT veteran that Craft-Bamboo were relying on after topping the final two sessions of the day.
The final moments of the day’s third session looked more like a qualifying run at Macau than an unofficial practice session – everyone was giving their best with teams throwing new tyres and their ace drivers behind the wheel to establish bragging rights ahead of Friday’s two official practice sessions.
Conservative through the early sessions, reigning champions Clearwater Racing threw down the gauntlet almost immediately with star recruit James Calado behind the wheel, the Englishman stopping the clocks with a best of 2:07.200 – four tenths quicker than Andrea Caldarelli’s 2014 pole time. At the time the lap was so good the former F1 driver (who has previous experience at KIC in a Force India F1 car) was almost two seconds clear of the field, but one by one, they chipped away at the advantage with Lyons leading the charge.
The most impressive challenger was new team OD Racing with another former F1 tester in Fairuz Fauzy at the wheel, the Malaysian Lamborghini pilot the first to take the challenge to Calado, before Lyons started to mount his attack.
Quiet through the opening sessions to give Sean Fu some valuable miles, SuperGT star and 2014 pole-sitter Andrea Caldarelli charged in the closing stages, his best just six tenths shy of Lyons, and just a tenth slower than Calado, the Italian though admitting he wasn’t 100% happy.
“I’m driving on the absolute limit to get a time like that, and I’m still six tenths off,” he explained. “We’ll go away and do some more work tonight and see what tomorrow brings. We are a new team, and we have a program to work through to suit all our drivers so it’s not all about going after a time today.”
His team-mate, another former F1 star with KIC experience, and his team-mate, Tonio Liuzzi concurred.
“We just can’t find the nice balance we had in testing at Sepang,” he added. “We know it’s there, we just have to dial it in, but today was a bit mixed with the green track, and our main focus was getting laps for our co-drivers, tomorrow we’ll start to dial in the potential of the car.”
Quick in P2, Jean-Karl Vernay was another to leave his run late, taking the J-Fly Racing Bentley Continental GT3 of Jeffrey Lee to fourth but over a second slower than Lyons, although the Frenchman’s laps were not all without incident, making contact with Zen Low in the OD Racing Lamborghini during the final session.
Another of the good news stories was the debut of the TP12 Racing Ferrari 458 entry of Piti Bhirom Bhakdi and new recruit Naoki Yokomizo, the experienced Japanese driver was subbing for the absent Carlo Van Dam, and he did an admirable job despite being another KIC rookie, running inside the top five at various stages through the day before handing the car to Piti to gain valuable laps.
In the end both Craft-Bamboo Aston Martins were in the top group, with both the experienced Darryl O’Young and his impressive young Australian team-mate Jonathan Venter within tenths of one another, signaling them as one of the most competitive partnerships in the field, a situation that 2014 KIC winners Davide Rizzo and Anthony Liu used to good effect to challenge for last year’s series crown.
Speaking of the talented BBT duo, the two Ferrari drivers – behind the wheel of a new AF Corse prepared 458 – were right in the mix again, with little separating the Chinese/Italian partnership. “We’re just going around,” Rizzo admitted matter-of-factly.
Whilst both Aston Martins were comfortably in the top group, so to were all three Bentley Team Absolute Continental GT3s, although the newest of the cars – the #77 entry of ‘Tiger’ Jacky Yeung and Englishman Duncan Tappy – saw limited running after a few minor technical issues through the opening two sessions. They weren’t the only ones either, with new GTM class recruit Jerry Wang sidelined for much of the day with a relatively minor electrical issue, the only problem the team had, was locating it in the myriad of onboard systems!
Whilst Thursday provided teams with valuable track time to dial in their cars and drivers, it really amounts to little in the overall scheme of things outside of bragging rights for the pace setters, however it did show who was strong, and who has work to do.
12-months ago Caldarelli was the pace setter at KIC, and he showed that the big normally aspirated Aston Martin V12 likes the circuit, an ominous sign for Craft-Bamboo Racing’s rivals, but we can’t expect too many accurate predictions though until qualifying sorts out the field on Saturday morning. One thing is for certain though, as was predicted coming into the event, there will be no shortage of challengers for the 2015 series crown, and that can only signal a weekend of more intense action.
The official element of the event will get underway tomorrow (Friday, May 14) with two one-hour practice sessions, ahead of qualifying and the first of the two one-hour scheduled races on Saturday.
Both races will be available to view on YouTube, Facebook and YouKu 2-3 hours after they are over, keep an eye on www.facebook.com/GTAsiaSeries for details, and also www.youtube.com/AFOSTV
The link for the YouKu channel in China is; http://i.youku.com/u/UMzQ2Nzc3MDAw
Rnd#1 2015 GT Asia Series
Korea International Circuit, South Korea
Combined times unofficial practice (14 May, 2015)
1. 88. Frank Yu/Richard Lyons (Craft-Bamboo Racing Aston Martin) – 2:06.783 [P3]
2. 1. Mok Weng Sun/James Calado (Clearwater Racing Ferrari 458) – 2:07.200 [P3]
3. 5. Fu Song Yang/Andrea Caldarelli (FFF Racing McLaren 650S GT3) – 2:07.321 [P3]
4. 7. Jeffrey Lee/Jean-Karl Vernay (Absolute Bentley Continental GT3)
- 2:08.067 [P3]
5. 86. Zen Low/Fairuz Fauzy (OD Racing Lamborghini Gallardo GT3)
- 2:08.266 [P3]
6. 8. Adderly Fong/Keita Sawa (Absolute Bentley Continental GT3) – 2:08.267 [P3]
7. 99. Darryl O’Young/Jonathan Venter (Craft-Bamboo Racing Aston) – 2:08.447 [P2]
8. 11. Piti Bhirom Bhakdi/Naoki Yokomizo (Singha Ferrari 458) – 2:08.820 [P3]
9. 37. Anthony Liu/Davide Rizzo (BBT Team Ferrari 458 Italia GT3) – 2:09.115 [P3]
10. 12. Richard Wee/Craig Baird (Clearwater Racing Ferrari 458) – 2:09.144 [P3]
11. 9. Jiang Xin/Max Wiser (FFF Racing McLaren 650S GT3) – 2:09.353 [P3]
12. 77. Jacky Yeung/Duncan Tappy (Absolute Bentley Continental GT3)
- 2:09.658 [P3]
13. 55. Hiroshi Hamaguchi/Tonio Liuzzi (FFF Racing McLaren 650S GT3)
- 2:09.893 [P3]
14. 23. Jerry Wang (Absolute Racing Audi R8 LMS GT3)* – 2:12.810 [P1]
15. 20. Keiichi Mori/Hisashi Kunie (Gulf Racing JP Porsche 997 GT3-R) – NTR
16. 22. Shouta Hanaoka/Kimihiro Yashiro (Gulf Racing JP Porsche GT3 Cup)* – NTR
*GTM Class
The GT Asia Series is sanctioned by the FIA as an International Series and is clearly recognised as the Region’s leading GT Championship. It is jointly managed and promoted by Motorsport Asia Ltd and the Supercar Club Hong Kong and is backed by Michelin, KW Automotive, Motul, Auto Art, Race Room, Panta and SEL.