PanGlobal Alex Yoong F1 Driver Search Rd 1 and 2
Shahrul Asraf Ishar and Hung Siang Wei grabbed the major honours in the PanGlobal Alex Yoong F1 Driver Search Rd 1 & Rd 2 which was successfully run yesterday (Sunday) at the Extreme Park KartQuest Circuit.
Shahrul, 26, a project supervisor from Shah Alam and Hung, 23, who is an engineer by profession and is from Kuala Lumpur, finished at the top of the podium in the Round 1 final and the Round 2 final respectively.
The Round 1 final was run as the first event of the day as it was carried forward from March when rain aborted the running at the Fast Track Speedzone Circuit. The other four finalists in Round 1 who will follow Shahrul to the Grand Finals in December are Khairul Izwan who finished second, Md Faisal (third), Lim Shuey Wen (fourth) and Md Haniff (fifth).
The Round 2 Heats were competed by 42 drivers and amongst them were four lady drivers, a 11 year old boy and a 45 year old vateren.
The four plucky ladies who gave the men a run for their money were 15 year old Tengku Sofnis Nabilah from Kuantan, 14 year old Natli Siow of Petaling Jaya, Yap Hui Nee (25) and Khor Siok :uan (28). Tengku Sofnis went on to qualify and raced in the Round 1 final while the other three just missed the cut for the final.
The sensation of the day was 11 year old Muhamad Naim from Setiawangsa in Kuala Lumpur who made it to the Round 2 final as a wild card as the tenth qualifier. He kept his cool starting from last on the grid in the final and made full use of his light weight to gradually move up to finish a sensational fourth in the 7-lap final race to qualify for the end of year Grand Finals.
At the other end of the age spectrum is Abdul Razak Abd Halim, a 45 year old vateren from Subang Jaya, also qualified for the Grand Finals by finishing fifth in the Round 1 final.
Syed Hafiz Azali, a 28-year old insurance agent from PJ, who finished second and clocked the fastest lap time of the day with a time of 1m 20.135s and Mohd Shanaz a 25-year old IT Head from Penang who finished third in the Round 2 final rounded up the five qualifiers for the year end Grand Final from the Round 2 final.
Round 3 of the PanGlobal Alex Yoong F1 Driver Search will again be run at the KartQuest Circuit in the Sunway Lagoon Extreme Park on the 16th of May 2004.
