• Spike finishes 8th in Race 1, his best season result in his rookie season in Porsche• Makes correct critical tyre decision for Sunday’s race but early mistake ends race
The young Australian Spike Goddard had a rollercoaster weekend at the 4.3 km-long Red Bull Ring track in the German Porsche Carrera Cup. In Race 1 he finished 8th achieving his best race result in his Rookie season in Porsche.
After last weekend’s Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup race at Budapest, Goddard was looking forward to returning to the Red Bull Ring Race Track and its beautiful setting surrounded by the Austrian Alps. The one-hour Free Practice session took place on Friday afternoon in perfect weather conditions. The MRS-driver managed 32 laps and set the 13th fastest lap time of the 24 drivers with a time of 1:33.692, only 1.2 seconds off the fastest lap of the session set by Philipp Eng, the Austrian driver. “The car feltreally good right from the beginning”, said Goddard. “At the end of the session I put on a new set of tyres (like most of the other drivers) and set consistent lap times, finishing in P13. Practice has provided us with useful information on Set-up that we need for qualifying on Saturday morning.”
The 35-minute qualifying session meant an early start on Saturday morning as it took place at 09:00 am. The lap times in qualifying were extremely tight with the Top-16 drivers fastest laps within 1.2 seconds of each other. Goddard’s fastest lap was 1:33.117, which was over 0.5 seconds quicker than he went in Practice the day before, but that was only good enough for 16thposition on the grid for Sunday’s race. His second fastest lap was 1:33.323, putting him 18th on the grid for Race 1.
Spike got a good start from 18th position on the grid in the incident-filled Race 1 over 14-laps on Saturday afternoon. At the end of lap one, he was able to gain two positions after a collision between Zöchling and Riberas ended their races and brought out the Safety Car onto the track for three laps. Soon after the race resumed, the Australian gained another two places as team-mates Müller and Ammermüller collided, fighting for second place and ending their respective races. There were other incidents involving Thiim and Cairoli that allowed Spike to gain further places. Over the second half of the race Spike was able to show good race pace and this allowed him to pass three other cars and advance further-up the field to come home in anincredible 8th position, ten positions ahead of where he started the race.
“This race was so much fun”, reflected Goddard afterwards. “Although I gained a few places from people retiring in front of me, in the end you have to drive your own race and finish it, which I did today and on the way having some great battles with other drivers. To secure eighth place feels amazing and I am very pleased with my overall performance in the race.”
Sunday morning and the drivers arrived to a very wet track as it had rained overnight. The sky was overcast but it had not rained during the two hours leading up to the second and longer race (19 laps). However, the most important decision of the race had to be made before the start. Do you start on slicks tyres or wets (rain tyres)? Everyone knew that track conditionswere going to be very difficult for the first few laps as the track would start wet. It turned out that 15 of the Top-20 drivers chose slicks on the belief that the track would dry and they would be the faster tyre as the race progressed. However, Spike and four other drivers chose wets on the basis that the track was wet and it was overcast and hence the track was not going to dry out and hence was going to be too wet for slicks.
Spike and the other four drivers were immediately proven to be correct. Having started the race in 16th position, in less than half a lap as the drivers on slicks struggled for any grip, Spike was able to gain ten places and was in 6th position as he approached Turn 3 of lap one. However, Spike approached Turn 3 going far too quickly and made the huge mistake of breaking on the racing line where the rubber from previous races made for very slippery conditions. He lost control and the car started to slide straight past the corner and into the gravel. Spike could not get his car out of the gravel and his race was over.
“I am totally devastated and really annoyed at myself for making such a stupid mistake. I correctly made the most important decision of the race, which was to start on wet tyres. I then got a great start, had a fantastic first sector where I passed ten cars and stayed out of trouble only to give it all away when I braked on the rubber and slid into the gravel”, said the 22-year-old. “I could have had a podium today as all the drivers who started on slicks struggled and eventually had to change on to wets as it started to rain. Most of those that started on wets finished in the top four. Due to me not finishing this race, I missed out on a lot of points and I have also lost my lead in the Rookie Championship. I have also lost valuable points for my team. I will fight to try and regain the lost ground in the Championship over the last three race meetings of the season.”
The next race is on 22nd August in the Supercup at the famous Spa-Francorchamps circuit in the Ardennes Forest outside Spa, Belgium.
