Race 1
• French Pair Take fourth Win This Season In Barcelona• Fässler-Camathias (Trottet Ferrari), 2nd and closer to the title as mainrivals Lietz-Roda (Autorlando Porsche) finish 4th• Podium for the Vittoria Ferrari, 3rd with Monfardini-Frezza• Cameron-Griffin (Mtech) win lively GTS race ended with an all-Ferrari podium: Makowiecki (AS Events) 2nd and Peter-Broniszewski (Kessel) 3rd
Porsche and the team IMSA Performance Matmut found again the way to victory today, asthey imposed their 911 GT3 RSR in a clear way in the first race of the Barcelona GT Open.Freshly-married Patrick Pilet and Raymond Narac were not afraid in this Halloween dayand went for a perfect race and a fourth win this season, keeping alive some titlechances.
Marcel Fässler and Joël Camathias finished second, therefore making another step forwardin their title bid, as main rivals Lietz-Roda (Autorlando Porsche) finished fourth. The Swissduo drove an impressive race, with Fässler dominating the first part of the race andCamathias clinching a superb second place, despite the Trottet Ferrari had a maximumhandicap of 45”. The Swiss pair has now a 32-point advantage (206 versus 174) on Lietz-Roda, while Pilet-Narac have 152 points. Excellent third today was the VittoriaCompetizioni Ferrari of Ferdinando Monfardini and Marco Frezza.
The GTS category offered a lively race, which had many stars in the first phase, mainlythe Corvette of GiacomoPiccini and the Ascari of Luis Monzón, but ended with an all-Ferrari podium. Duncan Cameron and Matt Griffin imposed the F430 of Mtech Racingahead of Frédéric Mackowiecki-Jean Philippe Dayraut (AS Events) and championshipleaders Philipp Peter-Michal Broniszewski in the Kessel Racing car.
Fässler takes the lead at the start followed by Aguas, Monfardini, Guiérrez, Peter andWiser, who gets busy in a beautiful fight with Giacomo Piccini (in the Corvette) and LuisMonzón on the surprisingly fast Ascari. The race was extremely lively since the first laps,with some incidents: Balandras and Kuzminykh got tangled in lap 1, while in lap 4 Monjeon the SunRed suffered a contact and was sent into a spin, touching the armco. In lap 9,Amaral loses his Porsche and spins hitting the Corvette of Brichet and the Ascari ofMonzón, which brings into the track the safety car for 3 laps.
At the re-start, Gutierrez stars passing both Aguas and Monfardini to take second, whileGiacomo Piccini has a contact with Perazzini before going off in lap 15, and Giammariapasses Monfardini.
In the lead, Fässler continues to fly and manages to rebuild an advantage of 12” beforegiving the car to Camathias and serve a long 45” handicap. Once the window for driverchanges is closed, it’s Pilet leading ahead of Frezza (who has passed Garofano, who willlater incur a drive-through), Camathias, Lietz, Bonetti, Cioci and Cameron (who leads theGTS category).
The final laps are pretty uneventful for the leading duo of Pilet and frezza, separated by10 seconds, while Camathias holds his main title rival Lietz behind him. In the GTScategory, Cameron is first ahead of Makowiecki, with Broniszewski and Guerrero fightingfor third and the Phoenix Audi of Piccini fifth, despite having to stop for a punctured tire.The final thrill comes in the last lap when Camathias passes Frezza and takes second andsome additional precious points.
