Tan takes victory in Singapore!
Singaporean driver, Yuey Tan took a Singapore GP class B victory in the Porsche Carrera Cup Asia over the weekend, scoring maximum points and putting him in contention for the class B championship title. Last Friday saw the Porsche Carrera Cup series take to the streets of Singapore as the first event of the Singapore F1 GP Weekend for the only practice session of the weekend, a session that lacked a lot of grip for the drivers, even though most drivers were on a new tyre. “Thirty minutes isn’t a lot of time to learn the circuit and there was not a lot of grip available during practice. Things were not easy but we managed to finish 2nd in class behind Alif Hamdan.” explained Tan. “There was definitely a lot more to come!”
Qualifying was set on Saturday afternoon, one of the warmest sessions during the GP weekend. With Tan hovering 6th in class for much of the second half of the session, his last lap was some seven tenths quicker than before, placing him up into 2nd in class behind Hamdan. “Yes, no doubt that it was hot! Though the circuit had considerably more grip on it. This made it easier to explore the limits of the circuit, brake later and get on the power just a little earlier in the corner. Unfortunately a mixture of mistakes and traffic on the circuit only allowed me to get a fast lap at the end of the session. A nerve-wracking moment!” Race day was to be something special for the Singaporean, his sixth visit to the Marina Bay Circuit on the streets of Singapore. There was only a tiny margin of time in qualifying between 2nd to 6th in category, just under a second separating five spots on the grid.
The race got underway at 1700 Sunday evening, with Hamdan going into a spin after contact with Team Basetex’s Zhang Zhen Dong pushing him down the grid. Tan took advantage of the situation and snatched the lead of the class B race and battled for over nine laps with Openroad’s Francis Tjia, and fellow Singaporean Ringo Chong just behind Tjia. “For the first nine laps, I could see Francis. Sometimes he got extremely close to me, I think in lap 6 or 7 after I made a big mistake over the curb in turn 3. Though I managed to hold on.” Though with only two laps to go, Hamdan appeared from the back of the pack after clawing his way back to challenge Tjia and Tan for the race. “At the beginning of the race I wasn’t sure what had happened, so to see Alif in my mirrors was a bit of a surprise. He made light contact with me on the straight but I think he was just communicating a ‘hello’ type of message! After a few corners, he came on the inside in turn fourteen and overtook! No worries and a clean move.” Though after crossing the line, the stewards called the young Malaysian Hamdan into the stewards office, and handed him a 30 second penalty for causing an accident during the race, handing the victory to Tan!
“As soon as I got out of the car, people were already telling me that Alif made contact with a few of the guys so the team knew we were still in with a chance. It only took minutes to find out and Alif got the penalty so we were all lifted a position each. I know that on the circuit, Alif finished ahead of us so we came second on track, though it’s still quite a memorable day nevertheless!” After Hamdan received his penalty, the other two drivers that joined Tan on the podium were the ever consistent Francis Tjia and Clearwaters Mok Weng Sun. After ten rounds of racing during the 2014 season, Hamdan leads the class B proceedings with a total of 151 points, with Francis Tjia in 2nd with 148 points and 3rd place with 146 points, Yuey Tan. The last two rounds will be held in Shanghai October 17-19th for the season finale event of the Carrera Cup Asia. For more information, visit carreracupasia.com for more details.
