The second race at Austin in the Pirelli World Challenge was run in the wet and didn’t bring much joy to the Ferrari customer teams, apart from one podium in the GTA category. Oliver Beretta, winner of race 1 on Saturday, nevertheless leaves Texas lying third in the championship, a handful of points off the leader, Austria’s Kevin Estre and second placed Ryan Dalziel from the USA.
Rolling start. Torrential rain at the Circuit of the Americas compelled the Race Director to call for a rolling start, rather than have the cars leave the grid from a standstill. Kevin Estre produced a brave getaway, cleverly running down the outside of the uphill Turn 1. This put him in the lead ahead of Nick Catsburg (Lamborghini,) Johnny O’Connell (Cadillac) and Ryan Dalziel.
Further back, Olivier Beretta was struggling in the wet in the R. Ferri number 61 Ferrari 458 and dropped a place, crossing the line at the end of the opening lap in seventh place. He was behind Madison Snow who had made a great getaway in the Audi from eleventh. On lap 3, the race was neutralised because of an accident and, at the restart, Estre made the decisive dash to secure the victory. Behind the leader, O’Connell was losing ground and was passed by Dalziel, who thus took a second consecutive runner-up spot. Then came Catsburg, Mike Skeen (Audi,) Ryan Eversley, who did very well to move up from 25th in the Honda and Snow, just ahead of eighth placed Beretta. Mike Hedlund was 14th in the 65 car of Scuderia Corsa, while the same team’s 64 car, driven by Duncan Ende was only 26th.
GTA. Things went better in the GTA Class, with Ricardo Perez, having started seventh in the Risi Competizione 62 car, fighting for victory with the winner of the first race, Porsche’s Michael Lewis.The Mexican then lost ground and was passed by fellow Ferrari driver Henrique Cisneros in the NGT Motorsport number 30 car, the Dane Christan Niesen (Aston Martin) and another 458 Italia the number 07 car of Mexico’s Martin Fuentes who was fourth.
Classification. Thanks to a fourth place in the first race and victory in the second, Estre leads the classification on 230 points, 6 more than Dalziel and 21 more than Beretta. In the GTA Class, Michael Lewis obviously leads, on 144 points, from Cisneros on 108 and Frank Montecalvo and Ricardo Perez tied on 103. The next round takes place at Saint Petersburg, Florida, at the end of the month.
