Craft-Bamboo Racing put on a strong showing of performance during the opening round of the Blancpain GT Series Asia with points finishes in the GT3 class and victory in the GT4 class. The team is now sixth in the GT3 teams’ championship and seventh in the drivers’, putting them in good stead to make their move up the ladder when the series heads to Thailand for the next round. Craft-Bamboo Racing’s GT3 championship challenge got underway in Sepang with the #88 Apex Porsche of Jules Gounon and Joel Camathias scoring a good amount of points by taking P7 in both races. The #99 VLT Porsche showed great pace early on, allowing Darryl O’Young to extract the most performance from the GT3 R to qualify P3 for race one. The Hong Kong driver put in a stellar stint to claim P2 before an incident in the second stint forced his teammate Peter Li to enter the pits, losing them valuable positons. Li started race two from P18 and the pair fought hard to successfully take seven places and finish the race in P11.  The team also kicked off their GT4 championship campaign with a win in race one. Frank Yu and Jean-Marc Merlin expertly steered the #77 Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport MR to victory and made history as the inaugural Blancpain GT Series Asia GT4 winners. The pair followed up with more success on Sunday, taking a second place podium only 0.5s behind the lead. Frank and Jean-Marc are now tied for the lead of the GT4 championship and have cemented themselves as the pair to beat this season.

Race One

#88 Apex Porsche 911 GT3 R

Jules Gounon started the first race of the season from P5 on the grid and maintained his positon into the first corner. An accident at the start forced a safety car period and once the race was green flagged, Gounon managed another good start to keep his P5 position once again. The Frenchman immediately became locked in a battle and began to close the gap on the car ahead, taking P4 within the next two laps. He worked hard to push the #88 Porsche in search of P3 but he couldn’t close the gap even with his consistently quick lap times. With the pit window now open, Gounon took to the pit lane to hand over to teammate, Joel Camathias. The #88 driver found the pace straight away but quickly came under attack from the Audi and BMW behind him.  He held off their attack for as long as possible but couldn’t match the pace that he needed to stay ahead. Now in P5, Camathias pushed on and continued his fight to the chequered flag. Over the next 15 minutes, the Swiss driver fought hard to bring the #88 Apex Porsche 911 GT3 R home in P7 to score its first points of the season.

#99 VLT Porsche 911 GT3 R

Darryl O’Young kicked off the #99 VLT Porsche’s campaign with a strong start from P3, keeping his position before a safety car period began due to an accident at the start of the race. After the restart, O’Young applied the pressure over the coming laps to snatch away P2 from the Ferrari. From here, O’Young put in a mega stint as he came under constant attack from the competition behind him. The Hong Kong driver displayed a masterclass in speed and defensive driving that allowed him to maintain his second place position before pitting to change to teammate, Peter Li. Li rejoined the fight in P3 and immediately found himself in a multi car battle for position. Still on cold tyres, the #99 driver found it difficult to fend off the advances of those behind. The Chinese driver fought as best he could but was now running in P8 where he would remain for the majority of his stint. Unfortunately, Li would have to make a late pit stop to clear debris from a blocked radiator, dropping the #99 VLT out of the points and forcing them to finish in P17.

#77 Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport MR

Jean-Marc Merlin was in charge of steering the #77 Porsche for the first stint and he made a good start from P2. Following the safety car period, Merlin made his move on the lead GT4 to secure P1. Merlin was faultless for the rest of his stint, building up a significant gap before handing the car over to, Frank Yu. The team lost time during the pit stop, which put Frank back out on track in P2. It wasn’t an issue for the #77 driver as he quickly closed the gap and reclaimed the top spot. As the race progressed Frank expertly managed his tyre wear and the gap between second place, crossing the line with a lead of 3.5s and securing the #77 pair’s first win of the season.

Race Two

#88 Apex Porsche 911 GT3 R

It was going to be an uphill battle for the #88 Porsche with Joel Camathias starting race two from P17. The #88 driver started strong though and began his charge to close the gap to the cars ahead. Camathias was able to make up a position before the compulsory driver change but couldn’t extract the pace necessary to catch the midfield. Gounon knew he had a huge fight ahead of him but kept focused and put the #88 Porsche to work. As the grid reshuffled positions following the closing of the pit window, Gounon was able to find several places over the coming laps and slip into P11 with 18 minutes remaining. From here, the young French driver was able to put the pressure on, and after some tough battles move up into P9. Continuing his push, Gounon muscled the #88 Apex Porsche up a further two places to finish the race in P7, which was an incredible effort for the pair who started the race in P17.

#99 VLT Porsche 911 GT3 R

Peter Li would start race two in the #99 VLT Porsche from P18, and after completing a clean start the former F3 driver began to make his way up the field. Li was pushing himself and the #99 VLT Porsche to the limit and was able to take four positions before handing the car over to O’Young in P16 at the start of the pit window. O’Young rejoined the competition and settled into P14 where he would begin his sprint to the finish. The #99 VLT driver was able to quickly find the car’s limit and use his experience to close the gap between those ahead. Continually gaining ground, the Craft-Bamboo driver was able to snatch another three positions by flag fall to finish the race in P11 just outside the points.

#77 Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport MR

Frank Yu started race two from pole position in the #77 Porsche and while he made a good start he could not find the same level of performance in the car as he had found in race one. An issue with the rear of the car wasn’t allowing Frank to realize the car’s full potential and forced him into P2 for the rest of his stint. Frank did his best to manage the issue and did well to keep hold of second place before handing the car over to Merlin. With a seven second gap to make up, Merlin hit the track and gave chase, dedicating his stint to the pursuit of victory. The experienced Frenchman did a brilliant job in reeling in the lead GT4 car and given a lap or two more, the #77 could have had their second win of the weekend. Merlin finished the second race only 0.5s behind P1, ensuring that the #77 Craft-Bamboo Porsche would be jointly leading the GT4 drivers’ championship and that the pair would secure their second podium of the season in Sepang.

Quotes

Richard Coleman, CEO of Craft-Bamboo Racing

“It was a solid start for the GT3 team in the Blancpain GT Series Asia this weekend in Sepang. Unfortunately, a little bit of bad luck kept us from the podium but I am glad we scored points in both races.  I’m delighted for Frank and Jean-Marc to have a win and a second place in GT4 establishing a championship challenge right from the start of round one. There is a lot of work to do but we now look forward to Thailand.”

#88 Apex Porsche 911 GT3 R

Jules Gounon

Race One: “We had a good strategy with our engineer and managed P2 after the pit stop. Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough speed to carry that position to the end so we finished in P7 but we still have more to do so we can improve.”

Race Two: “It was fantastic for us to take the car from P17 to P7, so we made some improvements to the car. It was a good way to finish the weekend with two P7s for the team. Thank you to Craft-Bamboo who gave me the opportunity to race this car and I hope to be back with the team for another round when I don’t have clashes with my European calendar. The team was fantastic and I am really happy to have driven with this team.”

Joel Camathias

Race One: “I discovered a nice track I didn’t know and it was a real pleasure to work with such a professional team like Craft Bamboo Racing. Clearly, we hoped for better results than seventh, but the positive note is that the team worked perfectly, and Jules and I gave our utmost.”

Race Two: “Again P7 in today’s race, it seems this was our position this weekend. We did the best we could, starting from the second part of the grid, we managed to climb up several positions, with Jules very strong at the end. Our strategy was perfect and the team did a great job, really there is little we could have done better. We have in front of us the same cars of yesterday, which are really unreachable, under current conditions.”

#99 VLT Porsche 911 GT3 R

Darryl O’Young

Race One: “There was a safety car early on and I managed to hold my P3 position. On the restart I was able to get off to another good start and overtake the Ferrari in turn 4. That got me into P2 and I was able to hold that position for the remainder of the stint. I couldn’t catch the P1 car this weekend; they just had too much pace. I was able to fight off some quicker cars today so I am happy with my drive.”

Race Two: “Race two was tough, we lost a lot of time somehow between Peter passing me the car. The pitstop went well but we still lost 3-4 seconds, so we need to look into that because that really affected my race. We lost a lot of time to the cars ahead and also got caught in the pack that was coming back around. That really cost us some time. The team did a good job this weekend, but we still need to work hard to make improvements. I feel the team has progressed but we need to push hard to go further.”

Peter Li Zhi Cong

Race One: “In general the car has been very good and we continually worked on finding the best setup. I struggled in Q2 to find a clear space for a clean flying lap. For the race, I was driving the second stint but we lost three seconds during the pitstop which cost us a lot. During the race it was tough at the beginning with cold tyres coming out from the pitlane. I was overtaken by the cars from behind with fresh tyres. Further into my stint I got a water temperature alarm and I had to pit and fix the problem. I feel I can improve on tyre management and traffic management during the race.”

Race Two: “There was an accident on the first lap so I dropped off the pace a bit. After the middle of my stint, I managed to catchup to my teammate in car #88, so I felt my performance was good. On the in lap I lost 3-4 sec on entry which cost us a lot. But I found good improvement during the race which I thought was much better than Race 1 with more consistent lap times. I’m happy that we finished both races and we still made some progress. Thank you to Porsche China who gave me good support this weekend and also to my teammate Darryl who gave me good advice during the whole week.”

#77 Porsche Cayman Clubsport MR

Frank Yu

Race One: “Jean-Marc started the race. There was a big incident at the race start but he managed to avoid the incident. Jean-Marc did a fantastic job and took one position to get us into P1. He passed the car to me and I came out in P2, we had some issue in the pit stop and fell behind, unfortunately losing the hard work that Jean-Marc put in before. I managed to take back P1 after a few corners and from that point on it was about nursing the car back as the tyres were quite shot during the final ten minutes. I want to thank the team and my engineer Matt Harvey for doing a fantastic job.”

Race Two: “We started in pole position but there was some issue with the rear of the car. I wasn’t able to push at all and was losing about a second a lap to the front runners. When I passed the car to Jean-Marc I think the lead car had a 6-7s gap on me. I spent most of my stint keeping to myself and pushing to get the car over to Jean-Marc as best I could.”

Jean Marc Merlin

Race One: “The car was very easy to push. I was able to overtake the pole sitter early and after that it was mostly managing the lead and looking after the car for Frank. It was a great start. The pairing with Frank Yu is ideal as we have comparable pace and we share the same goal: race hard while having fun!”

Race Two: “I had a really enjoyable stint chasing the leader. I could not fully take advantage of their braking issues at the end, but I would have only needed a few more turns to pass and claim victory. Great results and a very good start to the season.”