After the team's 200th World Championship GP celebrations a fortnight ago in Korea, Faster Than Speed scored another 2 points at Abu Dhabi's Yas Marina Circuit, with John-Eric Saxen finishing in 9th place.
Zoltan Csuti drove his second WC race for the team, again showing a solid performance and finishing on the verge of scoring points, in 11th place.
In the World Championship, John-Eric Saxen and Zoltan Csuti, who again replaced Giuseppe Marconi this weekend, qualified in 12th and 14th places respectively, with both drivers missing out on Q2 by a small gap.
John-Eric opted for a 3-stop strategy which, while initially cost him a few positions at the start, paid off later in the race. Several battles ahead meant John-Eric kept up with the pack and even lost a bit of time in traffic despite the heavier car. With most drivers opting for 4-stoppers and other 3-stoppers coming in a lap earlier, John-Eric took the lead at the end of lap 13 and led the race until pitting at the end of the following lap. Showing good and consistent pace despite carrying a higher fuel load, John-Eric jumped Tali after the last round of stops to reach 9th, position he would keep until the checkered flag, scoring two valuable points.
Zoltan made a very good start, gaining a few places before passing Varga and climbing up to 9th. A few laps later, he made great use of a battle between Gosbee and De Wit to squeeze through De Wit and move up to 8th. He ran as high as 3rd before pitting for the first of his 4-stops. While a couple of errors plus receiving contact from other drivers a few times during the race compromised his chances, Zoltan battled hard once again against established WC drivers, pulling off some good overtaking moves in the process. While he was disappointed not to score his first WC points, finishing on the verge of scoring, in 11th place, was an important achievement for the young Hungarian in only his second WC start. We thank again our friends at NetRex Grand Prix for allowing Zoltan to drive the FTS-P12.
John-Eric Saxen (9th): "I didn't have high hopes for this track, so the end result was about where I expected to be.
In Qualifying I again just missed out on Q2, as usual by a small margin. Anyway, this allowed me to experiment with the strategy and go for a 3-stopper instead of 4-stops.
The strategy turned out to help me quite a bit. Even though it cost me positions at the start, I was able to keep up with the battling 4-stopper group quite easily. In fact, the battling cars ahead were somewhat slower. Anyhow, this strategy meant it had no point to try risky overtakes and waste more time, so I just waited for everyone to pit and continued on a steady pace. During the final pitstops Tali surprisingly lost much time somewhere, meaning I could jump him and eventually finish 9th.
One more race to go, hopefully the season ends on a high note on one of my favourite tracks."
Zoltan Csuti (11th): "This was my second WC race. Qualifying wasn't good, I was 14th. The race start was good, as I overtook 4 cars, but I was unlucky, and pace was slower than expected in race conditions. I spun on lap 40, but luckily didn't lose any positions. I finished in 11th place, which wasn't the result I hoped for. I hope to do better in Brazil."
In the World Trophy, NetRex GP's Paul Berndt made his FTS debut. Despite a back-of-the-grid penalty, he drove well to take his first points of the season, finishing in 14th place.
Faster Than Speed will be now heading to Interlagos, for the final round of the 2012 season. FTS has great memories from past Brazilian GPs, with the team victorious in WS Ace and Advanced in previous seasons, at the venue where it celebrated its WS Advanced double title in 2008. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter (@FTS_Racing) and Google+ for the latest news and live coverage from Brazil!
Faster Than Speed
Press Release
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